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Travis Nelsen, Former Okkervil River Drummer, Dies

Travis Nelson
performs on stage during Bonnaroo 2009 on June 14, 2009 in Manchester, Tennessee.

Travis Nelsen, Okkervil River’s drummer from 2003-2010, died on Tuesday (April 7). The band announced the news in an Instagram post on Thursday.

The cause of death was not revealed. SPIN has reached out to the band’s rep for more information.

“He was a radiant, hilarious, charismatic, generous, passionate human being with a heart that was completely open and his special power was his ability to wrap his friends in love and to hurl himself out into the world with everything he had. And he played drums like no other person on earth. If you ever saw him play live you remember it – maybe more than anything else about the show,” a statement from the band read.

After joining Okkervil River in 2003, Nelsen appeared on Black Sheep Boy in 2005, The Stage Names in 2007 and the following year’s The Stand Ins. Nelsen also played on the band’s collaboration with the late Roky Erickson, True Love Cast Out All Evil, 2010.

See the band’s full statement in the Instagram post below:

https://www.instagram.com/p/B-w6kRqFHRH/?utm_source=ig_embed

For the record: A previous version of this post misspelled Nelsen’s last name. We regret the error.