A band that spent years apart, got back together, and then booked a Christmas show called Creedmas is a band with a very clear idea of how it is perceived. That self-awareness is the best thing about this booking. Underneath the pun sit four original members and a catalog that owned American rock radio for a stretch of years, played across two December nights at BleauLive Theater.
All four of them, and the songs that earned it
Creed turns up with the original lineup whole: Scott Stapp on vocals, Mark Tremonti on guitar, Brian Marshall on bass, Scott Phillips on drums. That matters more than it usually does, because what people actually remember about these songs is the specific collision of Stapp's delivery and Tremonti's riffs, and half a lineup does not reproduce it. The set runs through Higher, My Sacrifice, One Last Breath and With Arms Wide Open, which won Stapp and Tremonti the Grammy for Best Rock Song in 2001 off the back of Human Clay. These were written for big rooms and they do what big-room songs do. A few bars into any one of them you stop listening to a band and start standing in a room where every single person already knows the words.
Where: BleauLive Theater, Fontainebleau Las Vegas, north Strip. When: two nights, Friday December 11 and Saturday December 12. Lineup: all four original members. Support: Tim Montana.
Check Creed Creedmas dates and tickets
Who it's for
Book it if you wore out Human Clay, or if you have spent twenty years pretending you didn't. This is a full-band rock show in a purpose-built theatre, loud and entirely unironic once the guitars start, and it is one of the few big rock nights on the December calendar here. Anyone travelling with teenagers who have discovered the back catalogue will find this an easy sell.
The caveat is a short one. If you want an evening of carols, this is not that evening. The holiday element is the name and the timing, and the songs are the ones you already know by heart.
What the ticket page won't tell you
These two nights fall inside the National Finals Rodeo, ten December nights that fill hotel rooms right across Las Vegas. Rooms go before concert tickets do in that week, which makes the accommodation the harder half of the trip rather than the show. Our National Finals Rodeo guide covers what else is running while you are in town.
