Former Fleetwood Mac guitarist Danny Kirwan has died at the age 68, prompting praise from band members and regrets that his talent was drowned in alcoholism and drug abuse.

Mick Fleetwood announced the death in a Facebook post, saying only that Kirwan died on Friday in London. No cause of death was given.

Kirwan was part of the iconic band from 1968-1972, playing on the albums Then Play On, Blues Jam at Chess, Kiln House, Future Games and Bare Trees.

His sensuous and lyrical guitar on the hit Albatross helped drive the hit to the top of the charts in 1968 and is still regarded as a classic.

But four years later the band cut him loose in mid-tour, unable to cope with his alcoholism.

Kirwan released four solo albums during the Seventies, but his career continued to decline amid alcoholic binges and mental health issues that left him broke and reduced to living on the street.

“Danny was a huge force in our early years,” Fleetwood wrote.

“His love for the blues led him to being asked to join Fleetwood Mac in 1968, where he made his musical home for many years.”

By 1993 Mick Fleetwood was so worried about Kirwan’s mental state he asked Scotland Yard’s missing persons unit to help him track down his former bandmate.

“I’ve been through a bit of a rough patch,” the broke and homeless Kirwan told an interviewer after being tracked down.

“I get by and I suppose I am homeless, but then I’ve never really had a home since our early days on tour.

“I couldn’t handle it all mentally,” he said of his former stardom. “I can’t settle.”

In the band’s Facebook post, Fleetwood hailed Kirwan’s legacy and said it “will forever live on in the music he wrote and played so beautifully as a part of the foundation of Fleetwood Mac”.

Kirwan was among the eight members of the band – along with Fleetwood, Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham, Peter Green, John McVie, Christine McVie and Jeremy Spencer – who were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1998.