Paging Scott Stapp and the remaining two members of Creed…
\nyour fifteen minutes of fame are about to expire.<\/p>\n
Harsh words to start the review of what is one of the most
\nanticipated albums of 2001, I know. Now, bear in mind, I happen to
\nlike Creed. They’ve produced some of the most powerful slabs of
\nhard-edged music in the last few years, and having seen them in
\nconcert in 2000, I know for fact they put on a killer live
\nshow.<\/p>\n
But
\nWeathered<\/i>, the latest release from Creed (and the first
\nsince the sacking of bassist Brian Marshall), tries to copy the
\nsuccess that Creed’s first two albums captured. If only they had
\ngrasped the brass ring a third time around; where the other two
\ndiscs seemed to create their own magic, this disc feels like it’s
\nfollowing in their shadows.<\/p>\n
In a sense, it is; like so many other artists who have had to
\nfollow up massive successes, Creed is in the unenviable position of
\nbeing expected to top
\nHuman Clay<\/i>, or to create another song like “Higher” which
\nwill infest the pop charts. “My Sacrifice,” the first single, is
\ncut from that same block, though it is not as strong as its
\ncounterpart, musically or lyrically. From the instrumental opening,
\n“My Sacrifice” has the feel of a blotchy photocopy, and Stapp’s
\nlyric is nowhere near as powerful, despite seemingly being another
\npainful personal lesson from his life. (At least that’s the vibe I
\nget from reading the lyrics – and I can’t help wondering if Stapp
\nis lamenting any loss of friendship between himself and
\nMarshall.)<\/p>\n
What’s sad is not that “My Sacrifice” is not as strong a song as
\n“Higher” or “With Arms Wide Open”; Yahweh Himself would have a
\ndifficult time topping those. No, what’s sad is that “My Sacrifice”
\nranks as one of the better songs on
\nWeathered<\/i>. While Stapp and crew try to take some chances
\nwith the songwriting, the bulk of the material starts to sound
\ncookie-cutter very quickly.<\/p>\n
Even the experimentation doesn’t always work. The
\nRage-meets-Pearl Jam vibe of “Bullets” is admittedly a different
\nway for Creed to have kicked this album off, but it doesn’t quite
\nsound like it’s the perfect match to their style of songwriting.
\n(This isn’t to say that Creed could never make such a combination
\nwork.) And while I do like the Native American touch to “Who’s Got
\nMy Back?” the song itself just has the air of underdevelopment to
\nit. Granted, had Stapp and guitarist\/bassist Mark Tremonti tried to
\nkeep the Indian vibe going, they might have failed on a grander
\nlevel, since this is one of the hardest styles of music for any
\nmusician to integrate into their work. (When they succeed, though,
\nit can be absolutely beautiful.)<\/p>\n
One experiment which does seem to work is using Stapp’s wife
\nAime as a backup vocalist on “Don’t Stop Dancing,” quite possibly
\nthe best track on
\nWeathered<\/i>. Like integration of the Native American style,
\nthis could have been dangerous, but her vocals are integrated well
\n(and sparingly – they’re beautiful, but had they been overused, it
\ncould have been tragic).<\/p>\n
Sadly, the rest of
\nWeathered<\/i> often sounds like these tracks were left over from
\nthe
\nHuman Clay<\/i> sessions. “Signs” and “One Last Breath” are two
\ntracks which smack of what could have been; by the time “Stand Here
\nWith Me” and the title track rolled around, I had personally begun
\nto lose hope with this disc. Even the disc’s closer, “Lullaby,”
\ntries to feed off the
\nHuman Clay<\/i> juggernaut, acting as a sequel to “With Arms Wide
\nOpen” as our hero sings to his daughter. (Yeah, just what I needed
\n–
\nanother<\/i> reminder of how lousy a parent I am.)<\/p>\n
It’s quite possible that Creed was rushed into putting out an
\nalbum to ride the wave of success they’ve been enjoying. It’s
\npossible that the band has not recovered from the dismissal of
\nMarshall, and Tremonti is trying to do too much as guitarist and
\nbassist. (Arguably, one of Creed’s trademarks at the start was
\nMarshall’s bass work.) Maybe Creed – God forbid – just put out a
\nsub-par album.<\/p>\n
Of course, with the demand that “My Sacrifice” has been getting,
\nthere’s no doubt that
\nWeathered<\/i> will top the charts, and Creed will enjoy a level
\nof success with this disc. But it’s a matter of time before people
\nrealize that
\nWeathered<\/i> is hardly the kind of quality album that people
\nshould have been expecting. A bad album? No. A disappointment?
\nYes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26038,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6399],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-37249","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-creed","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37249\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37249"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}