After a rugged late 2006, Kid Rock says he`s "back focusing what I do best - music." The genre-blending Detroit artist is hard at work on his eighth album, which will be his first of new material since 2003`s 'Kid Rock.'

Rock - who divorced media starlet Pamela Anderson in November, after just four months of marriage, then mourned the December death of Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun, a close friend - tells Billboard.com that he hopes to have the album done and finished "soon - this year for sure. There`s no way I want another year to go by."

Rock says the material is leaning towards hard rock - "I`ve got an album of bangers," he declares - and that there`s a lot of it. "We`ve got so much... we`re trying to narrow down so I can finish it off. It`s... tedious."

Rock confirms that Rick Rubin is helping with the album, though not in a primary producing role. "He`s just been doing editing and listening to songs, talking about a lot of stuff," Rock explains. "He`s had some good suggestions so far, good direction." Rock doesn`t foresee many guests on the album, though he`s courting Fats Domino to make an appearance.

One thing he hopes to do, however, is design a full-scale campaign for the album`s release, which, surprisingly, is something he says he`s never done before.

"I`d like to give it six months time - put out a single, start doing radio promotions, the whole thing," Rock says. "I`ve never had things lined up like that, ever. It`s always been, 'We`ll give you a million dollars cash if you put a record out in the fourth quarter.' 'Hell yeah!' But this record I really want to set up the right way."

Taken from M&C