His Own Prison

The Sunday Paper, February 19 2006

Maybe we should give Scott Stapp the benefit of the doubt

Times change. Bands, genres and fashions come and go. But one thing remains constant: Hating Scott Stapp, the former lead singer of the rock band Creed, is always in vogue. It's expected that critics and hipsters will dismiss him out of hand. But even at the height of Creed's popularity, Stapp came under fire from his own team: from alternative radio DJs (99X's now-defunct "Morning X" team once held a "Jesus or Creed?" contest, requiring participants to distinguish Creed lyrics from Biblical text), other bands and even fans (four of whom sued the group after a particularly disastrous 2003 concert).

"That hurt, man," Stapp says. "Taking shots from other artists, I'll be honest, that hurt me."

You probably don't feel particularly sorry for Stapp, and he'd be the first to concede that you don't have much reason to. During Creed's turn-of-the-century heyday, he developed a reputation as an arrogant, pompous bully. A widening perception of Creed as a proselytizing Christian band, based on the overt spiritual bent of Stapp's lyrics and fanned into a roaring flame by his messianic postures, didn't help any.

"The band, they got into this for probably the same reasons a lot of bands do—sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll," he says. "To get the Christian label, that was a shock to them. They probably resented me for that. It led the whole band to a couple of drunken nights, I can guarantee that."

By his own admission, Stapp has had more than a couple of drunken nights since Creed splintered apart—in addition to well-publicized bouts with OxyContin, Percocet, Xanax and the steroid prednisone. Last Thanksgiving, he notoriously got into a drunken brawl with members of the band 311, following that up a few days later with an embarrassing appearance on Spike TV's "Casino Cinema."

Stapp seems aware that his increasing profile as a drunk slipping down the slope toward has-been status necessitates some serious damage control—especially in light of an impending tour to promote his solo debut, "The Great Divide." (Which probably explains why the former megastar sat politely through a phone interview with a modest-sized Atlanta weekly last month.)

Musically, "The Great Divide" isn't all that different from Creed—lots of midlevel post-grunge riffs and arena-rock ballads—yet Stapp doesn't paint himself as a savior or a martyr. The album doesn't lack for aggression or bombast, but songs like "Hard Way" and "Surround Me" suggest a hard-won, if fragile, sense of equilibrium. In conversation, he seems the same way. Far from appearing awkward, impatient or put-out, he comes across as friendly—chatty, even—and exudes an air of contrition that feels sincere.

Watching his drunken "bonehead mistakes" on television "helped me realize that [alcohol] might be something I need to cut out of my life," he says. "I said, 'I don't wanna be that guy. Is that how I am?' There's always gonna be pruning left to do on this tree. But I think I pruned that branch … I make mistakes every day, and sometimes mine get captured on TV. That's no excuse, but you know what? That mistake will never happen again."

So I was disappointed last week to learn that Stapp had been arrested in Los Angeles on suspicion of public intoxication—the day after his wedding, no less. Call me a softie, but I want to believe him. I've been as guilty as anyone of turning my nose up at Creed. But there's a difference between disliking a self-involved rock star and actively rooting for the downfall of someone who has a problem and genuinely seems to want to do better.

So why not give Scott Stapp the benefit of the doubt? Who hasn't been a jerk somewhere in their past? Who can't relate when he says, "Wanting something and being able to live by it are two different things"? It's easy to laugh at celebrities we've never met, and to eagerly anticipate their ruin. But you know, that's what the Black Eyed Peas are for.

.Kevin Forest Moreau