Death / Cynic drummer Sean Reinert has died at age 48. News of the technical giant’s death began making the rounds on social media today, with longtime friends of Reinert memorializing the musician.

Reinert’s discography is a highly celebrated one, beginning with Cynic’s first demo in 1990. In the following few years, he’d drum on now-iconic metal albums including Death’s Human and Cynic’s Focus. Reinert drummed on Cynic’s full discography, along with albums by James LaBrie, Gordian Knot and Portal.

Reinert publicly came out as gay alongside Cynic frontman Paul Masvidal in 2014, receiving well wishes from Judas Priest legend and LGBT icon Rob Halford. "Gay people are everywhere, doing every job, playing every kind of music and we always have been," Reinert told the L.A. Times. "It's taken me years to finally be brave enough to say, 'If you have a problem with that, then throw out our records. That's your problem, not mine.'"

In 2017, Reinert formally parted ways with Cynic after reaching a legal settlement with Masvidal on the band’s name:

Today I post with a heavy heart, but also a lightened spirit. A settlement has been reached between Paul and I in regards to CYNIC. I am unable to disclose any of the details regarding this agreement but I am at peace with the arrangement. I am going to step aside from CYNIC and continue with my personal projects - Paul is going to continue with CYNIC and his.

I want to take this last Facebook post as an opportunity to humbly thank all of the musicians, engineers, technicians, companies, booking agents, managers, crew, press, labels and friends that I've worked with (and will likely continue to) over this past 30-year span.

Most of all - I would like to thank the fans, who to this day still blow me away with their loyalty and love. You've always been the inspiration and the fuel for the machine!

To Paul, I sincerely wish him and the musicians he hires nothing but the best.

We’d like to thank Sean Reinert for his virtuosic drum work over the decades and offer our deepest condolences to his loved ones. See some of the comments and tributes to Reinert below.