It was five years ago that Deftones former bassist, Chi Cheng, was in a car accident with his sister. While she was wearing a seatbelt and walked away with only minor injuries, Cheng wasn’t so lucky. Not being buckled in, he was thrown from the car and had spent the last five years trying to recover. Last week, on Sunday, April 14 his battle finally came to an end, after he passed away at the age of 42.

Cheng’s life was very full, co-founding the Deftones with Stephen Carpenter, Abe Cunningham, and the band’s frontman, Chino Moreno in 1988. The group spent the next two decades recording hit after hit, and were working on their latest collection of hits when Cheng was in the accident. The album was naturally put on hold, but after Cheng was in a coma for a year, and then a semi-conscious state for the remainder of his life, the band started playing with backup bassist Sergio Vega.

The news of Cheng’s passing was first announced on the website, oneforlovechi.com, a website that had been set up by fans to provide updates on Cheng’s status, show support, and collect donations for his care. It was his mother who posted to the site on Sunday saying,

“He left this world with me singing songs he liked in his ear.”

The website has currently been shut down due to a large volume of traffic received since news of Cheng’s passing broke. The band has not yet officially commented on losing their former band member.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 22nd, 2013 at 8:00 am and is filed under Concerts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.