Blog Prompt Friday: What CD are you currently listening to?I can't stop listening to Scott Stapp's first solo CD, The Great Divide, that just came out a couple of weeks ago. But I need to back up so you have a little context.
I was a bit of a latecomer to the Creed minions when they released their first CD, My Own Prison, in 1997. The album had probably been out a year before I became familiar with their material, but once I did, I was fascinated. I loved their sound—heavy, groove-laden tracks in which your body automatically matches and moves with the grooves. But for me, their lyrics, sung by Scott Stapp's powerful, honest, searching, and sometimes despondent voice, were always the draw.
My first taste of Creed was their title track from My Own Prison. The lyrics begin this way: A court is in session, a verdict is in / No appeal on the docket today / Just my own sin. Here are a few lyrics later in the song: Alone I drop and kneel / Silence now the sound / My breath the only motion around / Demons cluttering around. Scott Stapp and guitarist Mark Tremonti are credited in the liner notes for writing all of the lyrics on this album. How many mainstream rock songs have you heard that address sin in such a serious fashion?
Stapp's childhood is now a well known story. He grew up in a Christian home and he butted heads with his father—who at times seemed to be quite overbearing. Stapp left as soon as he was able and often struggled with his faith and his day to day existence. But it's apparent that he was always painfully aware of his standing before God, regardless of whether his father raised him properly or not. The entire My Own Prison CD is full of struggle, and pain, and lack of purpose, and confusion. And during one such song, What's This Life For, in which Stapp repeatedly violated the third commandment in a gut-wrenching song about children who live and die without ever finding purpose.
With such honest lyrics, (and in spite the misuse of the Lord's name), many in the Christian community took notice of Creed and soon people were wondering if they were a "Christian band." The band wanted nothing to do with such a label, but their second CD, Human Clay, just fanned the flames.
A song from that album called Faceless Man contained these lyrics: Now I saw a face on the water / It looked humble but willing to fight / I saw the will of a warrior / His yoke is easy and His burden is light / He looked me right in the eyes / Direct and concise to remind me / To always do what's right. The "yoke" reference is a direct quote from Jesus in Matthew 11:30: "For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." The songs on this album were also written by Stapp and Tremonti, but by then, fans began to assume that Stapp's struggle with his faith was driving the lyrics.
He ran from such assumptions and reportedly the rest of the band scratched their heads and began to wonder about the lyrics. Their third release, Weathered, contained more of the same. A song called One Last Breath contained these lyrics about a man who was on the brink of losing his battle with sin: I'm looking down now that it's over / Reflecting on all of my mistakes / I thought I found the road to somewhere / Somewhere in His grace / I cried out heaven save me / But I'm down to one last breath / And with it let me say / Let me say / Hold me now.
Creed split up after that album and reports began to surface about Stapp coming back to the faith he grew up with as a child. During an interview in 2004 with Christianity Today, he described himself during his time with Creed as "a struggling Christian who was trying to find holes in everything he had been raised to believe. I was a doubting Thomas. I was raised in a climate where I believed in God because I was afraid of going to hell—and I didn't think that was the right way to fall in love with somebody. I always believed in God and Christ, but I was in rebellion—trying to make my relationship with God fit into my life instead of making my life fit in with him. I was stubborn."
During the same interview he said that he had recently turned to his father and to his pastor for help and that he was "really soul searching and, I guess, on my path to coming home spiritually. And once that process began—and I'm still going through that process, and probably will for the rest of my life—that's when things started changing in my life. I started making some proper decisions, getting things in order."
He considers himself to be an artist who is a Christian rather than a Christian artist. And if you've had a chance to listen to his lyrics on The Great Divide you'll notice a slightly more upbeat, but still brutally honest, Scott Stapp. Listen to his will to fight in the song Justify: I met a man in New Orleans wore a Half Suit with Dark Blue Jeans… / Kicked his heels together winked at me real nice / I Saw Him from a mile away / But in my state of mind I let him make his play / 'Hey boy…have you seen the other side' / Yea…in this man I saw the devils hand so I looked at him man to man and said… / 'This time it's gonna be a fight!'
By his own admission and his own lyrics, Scott Stapp doesn't always live the way he knows that he is supposed to live. Most recently he was in an altercation with a band called 311 in a hotel bar and at this point nobody really seems to know what happened. Regardless of whether he was in the right or wrong in that particular situation, Stapp's willingness to struggle with his faith on a public stage is impressive to watch. He never seems to hide from the current path that he's traveling. Of course, as a result of his unwillingness to hide, some in the Christian community probably shy away from his music. And others might shy away from his music because he refers to his faith too openly in his music. But in a world where hiding is the norm, I suspect that his lyrics speak directly to the hearts of many people who fight their own internal wars.
