Men At Work Star's Death Investigated In Oz

An Australian detective has said the sudden death of Men at Work musician Greg Ham did not appear to be suspicious.

Friends found 58-year-old Ham's body at his Melbourne home on Thursday.

Police Detective John Potter would not comment on suggestions that drugs were linked to the musician's death.

But he said there was nothing sinister about the death of Ham, whose saxophone and flute punctuated Men At Work 's 1980s hits.

"I can confirm that a post-mortem will be held today, we won't know the cause of death until we get that report," he told ABC Radio.

"At this stage there is nothing to suggest that it's a suspicious investigation. However we'll wait and make that assessment once we know.

"We'll get an indication fairly quickly, but certain tests do take weeks."

A friend who found Ham's body said the musician had not been the same since 2010, when a court ruled that his signature flute riff from the song Down Under had been stolen from a classic campfire song.

Pharmacist David Nolte, who had known Ham for 30 years, and another friend had not heard from the musician in some time so they went to check on him.

Mr Nolte said the Ham's cats were outside the house and appeared unfed, and all calls had gone to his voicemail for days.

After banging on the door and calling for Ham - the lone occupant of the house - they went into the property and discovered his body.

Mr Nolte declined to elaborate on the condition of Ham's body, citing privacy reasons and the pending police investigation.

"Even though he was famous, he was a very decent, kind, humble person," Mr Nolte said.

Men at Work topped charts around the world with the songs Down Under and Who Can It Be Now? and won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1983.

Mr Nolte did not want to speculate on Ham's mental state in his final days, but said his friend had been shattered by the court battle.

"That really did affect him... he was sad. He put on a brave face, but he wasn't the same Greg Ham," Mr Nolte said.

The band's frontman Colin Hay issued a statement expressing deep love for Ham, who he met at school in 1972.

"We played in a band and conquered the world together," Hay said.

"I love him very much. He's a beautiful man. The saxophone solo on Who Can It Be Now was the rehearsal take. We kept it, that was the one. He's here forever."

Ham was perhaps best known for playing the flute riff for Down Under, which remains an unofficial anthem for Australia.

But the tune came under intense scrutiny in recent years after the band was accused of stealing the catchy riff from the children's campfire song Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree.

Ham later said the controversy had left him devastated, and he worried it would tarnish his legacy.

"It has destroyed so much of my song," he said after the court ruling.

"It will be the way the song is remembered, and I hate that. I'm terribly disappointed that that's the way I'm going to be remembered - for copying something."