Dave Grohl decided to continue making music after Kurt Cobain's death because he witnessed a sign from the "universe".

The 57-year-old musician starred alongside Cobain - who died in April 1994, aged 27 - in the rock band Nirvana, and Dave has revealed how he decided to continue making music after a road trip in Ireland.

During an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Dave explained: "When Nirvana ended, I wasn't sure what to do. I didn't know if I wanted to continue playing music. It made me sad to think of playing in another band and losing Nirvana, losing Kurt was a really dark, emotional experience."

Searching for clarity, Dave rented a car and drove around the Ring of Kerry in Ireland, and it was there that he received the sign he needed.

He said: "All I wanted to do was disappear. As I was driving down this country road I see a hitchhiker and he had a Kurt Cobain T-shirt on. To me, I thought, this is the universe telling me, 'You have to continue. You have to move on. You have to go forward.'"

The encounter convinced him to press on with his musical career.

He said: "Music has always been the love of my life. It's helped me through some of my most difficult moments and when I saw the kid with the Kurt Cobain t-shirt, I thought, 'Okay. I need to keep going.' I have so much reverence and respect for the past but I need to have a future."

Meanwhile, Dave previously described his time in Nirvana as "some of the greatest highs of [his] life".

The musician - who starred in the band between 1990 and 1994, before he formed Foo Fighters - told GQ magazine: "Nirvana, for me, was a personal revolution.

"I was 21. You remember being 21? You think you know it all. But you don't. I thought I knew everything. And being in Nirvana showed me how little I really knew.

"They were some of the greatest highs of my life, but also, of course, one of the biggest lows. Those experiences became a footing or a foundation on how to survive."