Signed with Wind-up Records

My Own Prison had been circulating around the music industry for a while when, in May 1997, Diana Meltzer from Wind-up Records heard the album and decided almost immediately that she wanted to sign them to the label, which had creative issues with Baboon over the latter’s reluctance to alter their image and sound to suit the label’s demands. Meltzer later said that she heard “an arena band”. Within the same week, Meltzer, together with Wind-up president Steve Lerner, CEO Alan Meltzer , and A&R representative Joel Mark, flew to Tallahassee to see Creed perform live and decide for certain whether to offer them a contract. “Seeing the energy in the room when Scott Stapp stepped up to the mic, and hearing his powerful voice fill the room, alongside Mark Tremonti’s now legendary guitar riffs and that big Creed anthemic rock sound, was all I needed,” she told HitQuarters. According to Tremonti in his “Wikipedia: Fact or Fiction” video in 2015, Creed had been rejected by Atlantic and Cherry Universal Records before Wind-up flew down to sign them. The band signed with Wind-up Records in 1997.