Scott Stapp discussed writing the Creed classics “Higher” and “With Arms Wide Open” in a new WRIF Meltdown interview. Ultimate-Guitar transcribed his comments.
“[With Arms Wide Open] was literally written in 15 minutes at soundcheck. I heard Mark [Tremonti] on guitar and I loved what he was playing, and I ran inside and I said, ‘Just keep playing that, man.’
“Then I just started singing the song and the words just came and the song came together right there.”
“‘Say I’ came together at soundcheck that quick, ‘Higher’ [both of which were released on ‘Human Clay’] came together that quick. When you get chemistry like that – Mark Tremonti and I had tremendous creative chemistry together – the songwriting doesn’t seem like that much of a challenge, things just kind of fall into place.”
Stapp also discussed getting clean and sober.
“My wife and my kids were critical in helping me get sober. It got to the point where it was either get sober or lose my wife and kids, man. And that’s about the lowest rock bottom that I could possibly have gotten to. So they were critical.
“Going down that wrong path, I just had so much in front of me. And being so naive, walking into it, I just didn’t know how to handle it, and it got a hold of me.
“Around the same time, I had my first onset of depression. And you combine that with self-medicating, with alcohol and whatever else you can find, and it’s a bad scenario, man. It took me years to really find out what was going on. I had to get to the other side of it. And it’s so nice to be five years on the other side of a wild ride.”
