Human Clay is the second studio album by American rock band Creed, released on September 28, 1999, through Wind-up Records. Produced by John Kurzweg, it was the band's last album to feature Brian Marshall, who left the band in August 2000, as well as the last album featuring the original line-up, until 2009's Full Circle.
The album earned mixed to positive reviews from critics and was a massive commercial success, peaking at number one on the US Billboard 200 and staying there for two weeks. The album spawned two singles that peaked in the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100: "Higher", which peaked at number 7, and "With Arms Wide Open", their only number one single. The album sold over 11.5 million copies in the US alone and over 20 million worldwide, making it the best selling album of Creed's career and one of the best-selling albums in the United States.
The title of the album comes from a lyric in "Say I" ("The dust has finally settled on the field of human clay"), a song which carries the same message.
Background
Human Clay is the only Creed album to not have a title track. The album had four music videos created for it: "Higher" and "What If" in 1999, "With Arms Wide Open" in 2000, and “Are You Ready?” in 2024.
Music and lyrics
The music on Human Clay has been characterized as "hard rock rooted firmly in the Seattle vein, complete with really big riffs and intensely introspective lyrics." Influences present on the album include Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains and Stone Temple Pilots. "They're not trying to stretch into political causes or worldbeat like Pearl Jam; they're not reveling in dark psychedelia like Soundgarden; nor are they attempting a glam-Abbey Road like Stone Temple Pilots. Creed is a straightforward grunge and hard rock band, embracing everything that goes along with that."[5] Laura Morgan of Entertainment Weekly described the sound as "lunkheaded kegger rock sculpted from [...] grunge riffs and aggressive discharge." She described the lyrics as "quasi-spiritual."[6] The material is considered to be more polished than on My Own Prison.[7]
Title and artwork
The cover artwork was designed by Mark Tremonti's brother Daniel, who had previously done the artwork and photography for Creed's debut album, My Own Prison (1997). According to Mark Tremonti, the album cover represents a crossroad which every man finds himself at in his life and the man of clay represented "our actions, that what we are is up to us, that we lead our own path and make our own destiny."[citation needed]
Release and commercial performance
The album was the band's first to hit number one in the US, where it debuted with first week sales of 315,000, and stayed on top for two weeks.[8]Human Clay was certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on July 16, 2001, for selling 10,000,000 copies, was later certified 11× platinum on January 29, 2004, and is the 54th best-selling album of all time in the United States (as of February 2007).[9][10] It ranks as the tenth best selling album in the U.S. since the advent of Nielsen SoundScan in 1991, and the ninth best-selling album in the U.S. in the 2000s.[11][12] It has also been certified 6 times platinum in Canada, 5 times in Australia, 7 times in New Zealand, and 4 times in Switzerland among others, selling an estimated 20 million copies worldwide.[13] The album has spent a record 104 weeks on the Billboard chart survey.[14] As of October 2014, it has sold 11,690,000 copies in the United States alone, according to Nielsen SoundScan.[11]
The album received mixed to positive reviews from critics. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine gave the album 4 stars out of 5, concluding that "it may not be the kind of thing that knocks out critics or grunge purists, but it does deliver for anyone looking for direct, grunge-flavored hard rock. [...] Human Clay does make it clear that there is an audience for post-grunge hard rock, as long as it's delivered without pretension and as long as it meets the audience's desire for straight-ahead, hard-hitting music."[3]
Laura Morgan of Entertainment Weekly called the album's riffs "tiresome" in a lukewarm review. She added: "Quasi-spiritual lyrics that have all the resonance of a self-help manual hardly help their cause. But so what? Chances are the opiate-hungry throngs will fist-pound in unison to such insights as 'Forked tongues in bitter mouths/ Can drive a man to bleed from inside out.'"[6]
Legacy
The album's third single, "With Arms Wide Open", won a Grammy Award for Best Rock Song in 2001.[25] At the 28th Annual American Music Awards, Human Clay won the American Music Award for Favorite Pop/Rock Album.[26] At the 2002 Billboard Music Awards, the album won the award for Catalog Album of the Year.[27]Human Clay was ranked number 422 in Rock Hard magazine's book The 500 Greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time in 2005.[28]Human Clay was ranked number 5 on Billboard's 200 Albums of the Decade in 2009.[29] VH1 listed "Higher" as one of the greatest hard rock songs of all time in 2009. The music video for "With Arms Wide Open" was voted the 92nd best music video of all time by VH1, who also ranked it number 4 on its "25 Greatest Power Ballads" list.[30]
In 2014, Tom Hawking of Flavorwire included the album in his list of "The 50 Worst Albums Ever Made", commenting: "I mean, obviously."[31] By contrast, in 2025 Lauryn Schaffner of Loudwire named the album the best post-grunge release of 1999.[32] That same year, she said it was the band's best album.[7]
↑Cailey Lindberg (September 28, 2015). "Scott Stapp Talks Creed Reunion, Guitarist Mark Tremonti Not Ready". Music Times. Retrieved May 15, 2021. Stapp's out of control behavior eventually led to a Creed break-up 10 years after the band released Human Clay, which sold a record 11.7 million copies with its blend of post-grunge musical aesthetics and Christian beliefs.
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