{"id":108992,"date":"2024-01-13T10:20:10","date_gmt":"2024-01-13T15:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/?p=108992"},"modified":"2024-01-13T10:24:02","modified_gmt":"2024-01-13T15:24:02","slug":"james-kottak-is-dead-at-61-popular-scorpopns-and-kingdom-come-drummer-won-the-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/?p=108992","title":{"rendered":"James Kottak Is Dead At 61: Popular SCORPIONS And KINGDOM COME Drummer Won The Battle"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Former SCORPIONS and KINGDOM COME drummer James Kottak died Tuesday morning in Louisville, Kentucky at 61. No cause of death has been given by his daughter, Tobi. <em>Word is that James had been sober for around 48 days before he died after a stint recently in rehab.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Scorpions paid tribute to Kottack in a Facebook post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">&#8220;Very sad news \u2026 our dear friend and Drummer for 20 years James Kottak has passed at the age of 61,&#8221; the band wrote alongside a black-and-white image of Kottak. &#8220;James was a wonderful human being , a great musician and loving family man \u2026 he was our Brother from another Mother and will be truly missed . \u2026 Rock \u2018n Roll Forever. RIP James.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Kottak was the drummer for Scorpions from 1996 to 2016, the longest stint for any member in the band.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Before that, he was the original drummer for another German hard rock band, Kingdom Come, from 1987 to 1995.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">In a sideline, Kottak also made some reality TV show appearances, including 2012&#8217;s&nbsp;<em>Ex-Wives of Rock.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Kottak struggled with alcoholism, and was arrested for public drunkenness in 2014. His illness caused him to be fired by Scorpions in 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-201.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"768\" height=\"432\"  data-gnlv=\"hey\" src=\"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-201.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-108996\" style=\"width:681px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-201.png 768w, https:\/\/themetalden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-201-600x338.png 600w, https:\/\/themetalden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-201-300x169.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">&#8220;We reached the point &#8211; or he reached the point -where it was just not worth it,&#8221; said Scorpions guitarist Matthias Jabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">The Louisville-born Kottak was married to Tommy Lee\u2018s sister Athena from 1996 to 2010. A custody battle ensued over their son, Matthew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">In 2019, Kottak also came out about his politically conservative views with his song,&nbsp;<em>Get Out of My Kountry.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Survivors and memorial plans have not been released.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former SCORPIONS and KINGDOM COME drummer James Kottak died Tuesday morning in Louisville, Kentucky at&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108993,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-108992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108992","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=108992"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108998,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108992\/revisions\/108998"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/108993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=108992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=108992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=108992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}