WENN

Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder is "in denial" over the passing of his pal Chris Cornell.

Cornell was in the middle of a tour with Soundgarden in May, 2017 when he was found dead in his Detroit, Michigan hotel room. His death was ruled a suicide by hanging which, for Vedder, is still tough to accept.

"I've had to be somewhat in denial," he tells SiriusXM's The Howard Stern Show. "I don't even feel like I had a choice. I was just terrified where I would go if I allowed myself to feel what I needed to feel or what I was instinctively wanting to feel or how dark I felt like I was gonna go.

"Because I didn't see him that often in the last 10 years " probably only, like, four or five times, and usually at a gig or something " I still haven't quite dealt with it. I'll get stronger as time goes."

Opening up on their friendship, he adds: "We were close. And it wasn't just because we were playing music. We were neighbors. I would hang out with him outside of the band more than even the other band guys, and I didn't know that many people in Seattle. So we would go on crazy hiking adventures, or we would go mountain biking, or we would chase the dog in the rain while drinking sh**ty beer" and it was cool.

"It had nothing to do with anything like being around other music people or being around some kind of L.A. life," explains the hitmaker. "It was just cool. Like, wow, this is what a quote-unquote legit rock star, this is what he's doing " he's chasing a dog in the rain with his buddy on a Saturday night with a 12-pack of Schmidt?"