Devil Without a Cause by Kid Rock

Devil Without a Cause, Kid Rock's fourth album, came out on Lava and Atlantic on August 18, 1998, and it's the record where he finally nailed down the character he'd been building: the self-styled redneck pimp, a trash-talking hybrid of hip-hop braggadocio and good-ol'-boy swagger. The sound caught up with the persona, too, a noisy, cheerfully crass fusion of rap, rock, metal riffs and a little country dust.

"Bawitdaba" is the battering ram, a shouted, stomping battle cry that turns a party into a riot, and it drove the album into the stratosphere. "Cowboy" is the one that pointed somewhere new, a rap song in a ten-gallon hat that helped lay the groundwork for country rap. "Only God Knows Why" slows it down to a surprisingly tender, world-weary ballad, and "Wasting Time" keeps the grooves rolling.

It sold more than 14 million copies and went diamond, and critics gave it credit for the way it mashed genres together.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.