Hayley Williams Wasn’t Sure It Was “Appropriate” to Speak After Chad Gilbert’s Death — Why Her Tribute Is So Careful
Hayley Williams waited three days before saying anything publicly about the death of her ex-husband, New Found Glory guitarist Chad Gilbert. When she finally posted on September 23, she began with the part many people had already been wondering about: she had not known what to say — or whether it was even appropriate for her to say it.
Gilbert died on September 20 at 45 after years of cancer treatment. Williams and Gilbert had been together for much of a decade, married in 2016 and divorced in 2017. Their relationship later became part of some of Williams' most personal writing about depression, anger, divorce and rebuilding her sense of self. That history is why her tribute is drawing so much attention now.
What Hayley Williams actually said about Chad Gilbert
Williams did not rewrite their relationship into a simple love story. She also did not use the moment to revisit its painful parts.
Instead, she focused on what Gilbert gave to the music world around them. She called him a “legend in the scene,” said their time connected to each other taught her a great deal, and credited him with introducing her to people, music and culture that continued to enrich her life.
Her strongest note of gratitude was about hardcore itself. Williams said Gilbert gave her a deeper understanding and reverence for that community, then sent sympathy to his family, New Found Glory family and friends.
It is a strikingly specific tribute. She thanked him for doors he opened and things she carried forward. She did not pretend every part of the relationship had become beautiful in retrospect.
Why their history makes the wording matter
Williams and Gilbert's relationship began around 2008. They married in 2016 and announced their separation the following year. In later interviews, Williams spoke much more directly about how difficult that period had been.
In a 2020 interview with the Guardian, she described the relationship as “very unhealthy.” Speaking to the Los Angeles Times that year, she referred to a “pretty toxic relationship” and discussed infidelity and the emotional damage she was working through in therapy. Her divorce and its aftermath also ran through Paramore's After Laughter and her solo album Petals for Armor.
That does not tell us what Williams feels privately today. It does explain why a conventional, uncomplicated ex-spouse tribute would have sounded false.
Gilbert's life also did not stop at that marriage. He married singer Lisa Cimorelli in 2020, and they had a daughter, Lily, in 2021. His wife and New Found Glory announced that he died surrounded by loved ones. The band is now planning to play its September 28–29 EPCOT performances in his memory, using six setlists Gilbert had helped prepare before his death.
So there are several circles of grief around the same person: a wife and young daughter, bandmates and friends, a music community, fans — and an ex-wife whose history with him was important and painful at the same time.
Reddit is arguing about what an ex owes the dead
The reaction has been unusually large. A Reddit thread in r/Music about Williams' statement passed 3,800 upvotes, while another in r/Fauxmoi passed 2,800. A separate r/popculturechat thread drew more than 1,600.
But the most interesting argument underneath the numbers is not really about celebrity etiquette. Some commenters praised Williams for finding something gracious to say. Others thought the careful language itself revealed how complicated the relationship remained. Another recurring reaction pushed back on the media phrase “breaks her silence,” asking why anyone should have expected an ex-wife to make a public statement within three days at all.
I think that last point gets closest to what makes this story feel familiar outside celebrity culture.
Death can create a strange pressure to simplify a relationship. Suddenly people expect a clean category: beloved, forgiven, mourned, estranged. Real relationships are not always that cooperative.
You can be grateful for what someone brought into your life and still remember what hurt. You can mourn a person without wanting the relationship back. You can respect the grief of their current family without pretending your own history was different. And forgiveness, when it exists, does not automatically require reconciliation or a rewritten past.
That is also why I would not call Williams' statement cold. To me, it reads as careful. Careful can be a form of honesty.
For readers carrying loss that does not fit a simple grief story, Grief in Recovery: How to Face Loss Without Losing Yourself looks more deeply at how grief can hold love, anger, lost time and identity at once. And Forgiveness in Recovery: Can You Forgive Without Trusting Again? separates forgiveness from restored trust, reconciliation and erased consequences.
More on complicated grief
Sources
- Los Angeles Times — Hayley Williams on Chad Gilbert's death, September 23, 2026
- Variety Australia — Williams' tribute and relationship context, September 24, 2026
- Kerrang! — Hayley Williams pays tribute to Chad Gilbert, September 24, 2026
- Rolling Stone Canada — New Found Glory's EPCOT tribute plans, September 24, 2026
- The Guardian — Hayley Williams on her relationship and therapy, March 12, 2020
- Los Angeles Times — Hayley Williams on divorce and Petals for Armor, May 7, 2020
- Reddit — r/Music discussion of Williams' statement
Featured image: Hayley Williams performing at the 2008 Virgin Mobile Festival in Baltimore, photographed by docmonstereyes, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons. Archival image; it does not depict the September 2026 statement. Inline image: Chad Gilbert performing with New Found Glory, LostLikeTearsInRain / cropped by Ja nobasu, CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.