Kid Rock

Born: January 17, 1971
Detroit, MI, USA

Bob Ritchie grew up in a small town North of Detroit called Romeo. He was raised in a middle-class Catholic family of four kids. His parents were partiers, which contibuted greatly to his musical ambitions and lifestyle. In fact, he started performing in front of his parent's friends at parties. School was not the Kid's number one priority. For a while, Rock's interests were in learning to break dance, and he joined a break dancing troup. Break dancing was on the cutting edge of hiphop music at the time, and he really liked listening to the rhythms of hiphop. He began experimenting with scratching records and mixing sounds between two turntables. Soon, he was rapping along with his own mixes, and he experimented with mixing southern rock and soul sounds into the beats. He was eventually signed to Jive Records in the early 90's, and he released his debut album Grit Sandwiches for Breakfast. He then toured as the opening act for Ice Cube and Too Short, which gave him the tremendous exposure he needed to kick-start his career. In 1993, he moved to Continuum Records, where he signed and released the follow-up album, The Polyfuze Method. Continuum gave him a lot more freedom to express his creativity, and he began concentrating on writing his songs about real-life material. This change in creative direction fueled his writing fire, and in 1998, he released the monstrous Devil Without a Cause, which launched the hits "Bawitdaba" and "Cowboy." His songs are geared toward the trailer-trash party animal in all of us. At the peak of his popularity, Rock is destined to put out more great music.