During the dark years before neo-garage and 1980s post-punk revivalism saved modern rock radio from itself, the airwaves were ruled by a gaggle of stultifyingly awful rap-rock outfits united in their middle class yowl and bent on demonstrating that the suburbs were, indeed, killing them. During that period, however, a critical need emerged for the fans of the popular mook rock: namely, some vaguely sensitive sounding shit that could help them convince that girl who was kicked off the field hockey team to put out. To fill that need, there emerged another group of bands, capable of producing sludgy and overwrought midtempo baritonica by the metric ton. Of that second group of bands, none ruled the landscape with a more glittery rock scepter than Tallahassee’s Creed.

Fronted by the energetic eyebrows of former law student Scott Stapp, Creed’s schtick was to blend their late 90’s watered-down grunge stylings with lyrical content suffused with heady Christian overtones. The faith-based content was kept subtle–more in the “Campus Crusade for Abercrombie and Christ” vein. The combination proved irresistible to fans, who gobbled up Creed’s albums by the yard and sent four singles from their initial public offering to the top of the Billboard charts. Last year, Stapp released his first solo record since the break-up of Creed, The Great Divide, and this past Tuesday night, Stapp was on hand at the 9:30 club. DCist was there to capture the experience, and ended up learning ten interesting things about the solo Scott Stapp.

(Photos by Kyle Gustafson)