Scott Stapp’s current solo single “Survivor” is about overcoming challenges and pulling through in the face of adversity. As the Creed frontman tells ABC Audio, while the song sounds like a victory cry in celebration of a defeated obstacle, he wasn’t quite in that place when he wrote it.
“If you listen to the lyrics of the song, it sounds like someone who is writing a song after they’ve gotten to the other side, after they’ve succeeded, after they’ve survived, after they’ve overcome the obstacle,” Stapp says.
However, Stapp, who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2015 and is now sober after battling substance abuse throughout his life, was very much in the middle of a crisis when he wrote “Survivor.” As he explains, he started writing down the lyrics to the song as way to inspire himself to keep fighting.
“[That] gave me strength, man, during that fight and those struggles to keep fighting on,” Stapp says. “To keep enduring, to keep pressing on, to keep surviving until I did eventually overcome the challenge and the adversity that I was facing.”
Now that he has come out the other side a “Survivor,” the song has taken on a new, global meaning for Stapp as the COVID-19 pandemic continues.
“Hopefully it can be a source of inspiration for those that are out there doing exactly what the song’s talking about,” he says.
“Survivor” is featured on Stapp’s latest solo album The Space Between the Shadows, which was released July 2019.
