Why do people hate Creed?
By the time the 1990s were dawning, a significant change needed to be made if rock music was going to survive. It wasn’t dying by any means if the charts were anything to go by, but every group coming from California seemed to look so much more cynical by the day and became more than a little bit ridiculous if the video for Warrant’s ‘Cherry Pie’ is any indication. So when grunge came along, it was a breath of fresh air, and it was only a matter of time before bands like Creed started beating that dead horse for all it was worth.
Before we go into the inner workings of one of history’s most maligned bands, what were the merits of Creed to begin with? Surely, no one gets to their position by accident, and despite their reputation of being completely talentless, their debut, My Own Prison, is still a relatively decent slice of post-grunge to come in the aftermath of Kurt Cobain’s tragic passing.
As soon as Human Clay reached the airwaves, something significant started to happen, and it was evident from the moment that Scott Stapp opened his mouth. Regardless of how well the rest of the band played, all that anyone could talk about was this hapless Eddie Vedder wannabe croaking out the melodies to ‘With Arms Wide Open’.
Then again, if we were to burn Stapp at the stake for sounding like Eddie Vedder, we’d probably be here all day burning the legions of other imitators of the Pearl Jam frontman’s signature croon. There was nothing wrong with wearing his inspiration on his sleeve, but hearing him sing about his spiritual journey made many people give him a few side-eyes.
There had been plenty of artists who wore their religious beliefs on their sleeve, but this felt decidedly different. ‘Higher’ had the basis to be a great song on its own, but as soon as Stapp talked about relying on Jesus rather than his own personal turmoil, it felt like he was trying to actively rewrite what that vocal style meant to people.
When Vedder came up, all of those songs were defined by pain and using music as a means to air it out to the world and let it go. In the case of ‘With Arms Wide Open’, folks may as well have thrown on a Poison record, as grunge had finally received the kind of mainstream acclaim that we all felt we collectively moved on from after hair metal.
So why is Creed hated?
Well, there’s the strikes of plagiarism and also the claims of being preachy, but even looking beyond that, there’s one thing that hurts more than anything else: wasted potential. As much as Stapp tends to be grating on most listeners, the real crime behind Creed is not letting the other musicians behind him get a chance to shine.
Mark Tremonti is a hell of a guitar player and has the potential to go toe-to-toe with some of the greatest in his field, and yet for every guitar hero moment he has on a track like ‘Bullets’, there are just as many ballads where he has to stick to basic chords while Stapp drones on about his help from a higher power. It’s one thing not to have that much talent to draw from, but to have that pure talent and intentionally stifle it is where it gets more than a little bit depressing.
It’s not like the rest of the band didn’t wake up and realise what they were dealing with, either. Outside of the reunion record Full Circle, hearing them relaunch as Alter Bridge with vocalist Myles Kennedy was a version of Creed who actually bothered to showcase themselves every now and again, especially with Kennedy’s soaring high register.
That’s not to say that anyone can really blame any of the band members for coming back to the group for any reunion tour. They know where their bread is buttered, and no one can fault them for wanting to play something like ‘Higher’ to millions of fans in stadiums. But even though a group like Nickelback have that same kind of ride-or-die fanbase, Creed is more of a case study into the final days of grunge. It had slowly been falling away over the years, but the minute Stapp was framed on a mountaintop with his hands stretched out for the Lord, it was all over.
