Breaking into the Top 5 now, with only one more post to go. With albums 7-5 on the list and classic singles leaping from a couple of those albums, 2000 was a very good year.

6.

I admire most of Harvey's albums, and all of them up to this point. But Stories from the City, Stories From the Sea is the only one I love — probably because it's so full of affection itself. After years of tormented, severe, magnificent English blues-rock of her own imagining, Harvey crossed the Atlantic and made her love album: A woozy, breezy, blushing but endlessly rocking romantic ramble through Manhattan and Brooklyn. In truth, I hadn't listened to it front-to-back in a few years before pulling it out during a summer vacation road trip this year. And I was taken aback at how gloriously well it had held up.

Song Sample: "You Said Something"

Like his former cohort Judy Peiser, with whom he co-founded the Center for Southern Folklore, Ferris understands how to be a true folklorist: He disappears into the background and, with tape recorder and camera, documents his subjects in their natural light.

In this week's issue of the Flyer, Leonard Gill reviews Ferris' newest book, Give My Poor Heart Ease. As Gill notes, the Mississippi-born Ferris, founder of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at Ole Miss and the former chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities, who currently works at the Center for the Study of the American South at UNC, will return to his former stomping grounds — the Center for Southern Folklore — for a booksigning at 7 p.m. tomorrow.

The book's title comes from a 21-minute film produced by Yale University Media Design Studio with the Center for Southern Folklore back in 1975. (View it at Folkstreams.net.)

Meanwhile, the book itself is chock full of revelations, such as this first-person narrative from Otha Turner in his prime:

"I can dance. I can sing, ride horses, chop cotton and plow, whoop and holler, cut somersets, do all that stuff. I got two acres and two-tenths of land. I bought it. Scurrying hard, my labor paid for it. I paid one thousand for the land and 150 dollars for the house. Paid three hundred dollars to move the house. And I rent twelve acres and a half of cotton land."

The first of the final three posts.

9.

Sri Lankan-born world citizen M.I.A. mashes up Western pop (Modern Lovers, Pixies, Duran Duran) with Third World rhythms on this follow-up to her ecstatic debut Arular. Where the earlier record was an intensely pleasurable, beatwise brass-ring grab, Kala is a more rattled, woozy sonic miasma. Fantasizing about a Third World stick-up of First World wealth as she demands (or does she?) that soulja boys the world over toss away their guns; losing her mind in the midst of putting "people on the map who never seen a map"; falling in love on a Darfur tour, rapping joyfully with Aborigine kids: No album this year took in more of the world or did so with such a playful, disorienting rush of ideas.

Song Sample: "World Town"

Goner Records' Alley Party, rescheduled after a rainy October, is on for Barbaro Alley (Main Street between Union and Gayoso) at 5:30 p.m. today.

It's free, it's outdoors, and the current weather couldn't be better — plus, who hasn't missed the enigmatic Harlan T. Bobo, who spent the last several months in France, slinging ice cream and awaiting the birth of his firstborn son, Nino Bobo?

On a side note, if you haven't caught the Magic Kids yet, here's a perfect opportunity to do so. See why the rest of the world — including Red Kross genius Steven McDonald, who traveled to Gonerfest to see 'em, along with the powers-that-be at eMusic, Matador Records and U.K. label Stiff Records — is going bonkers for the Kids' Phil Spector-meets-punkish pop pastiche.

I’ve chosen to implement a completely different strategy for determining my Pearl Jam list than my last one, however. With U2, I listened to every album for a refresher and then made my list after the fact. For Pearl Jam, I have listened to each album, in order, and ranked each song as they played. (To wit: “Once” was number-one on my list until I listened to “Alive,” and then it dropped to two, until I listened to “Why Go,” when it dropped to three, and so on.)

Pearl Jam recently released a new album, Backspacer. I haven’t listened to it yet, and it seemed mildly appropriate to work up a list based on everything that came before it. Consider this a snapshot of my Pearl Jam opinions the day before I buy their next.

A note about eligibility: Pearl Jam has something like an open-source relationship with their fans. They’re prolific and they release scads of material in non-traditional formats such as fan-club extras, soundtracks, tributes, EPs, singles, official bootlegs, etc. In light of this, I created a list that assumed no studio Pearl Jam song was off-limits. That’s not to say I’ve heard everything there is out there. But I made a fairly concerted effort to access as much as is commonly available. Many rarities were collected on the band’s Lost Dogs two-disker, and I highly recommend it to anybody who’s into Pearl Jam enough to still be reading the words I’m typing here.

I ruled ineligible all live versions, because I just ain't got that kind of time on my hands. This is Knowledge Bowl season, yaknow.

Pearl Jam Top 40 Songs:

With an unprecedented amount of concerts scheduled over the next four weeks, November is shaping up as Get Your Ass Off the Couch and Go Out Month. My bank account is already hurting just considering the expense, but check out these highlights from the calendar at the Hi-Tone Cafe:

On Thursday, Nov. 5th, a solo performance from Small Faces organist Ian McLagan, who, like Booker T. Jones, delivers soulful chords via a Hammond B3. On Saturday night, an appearance from R&B wildman Andre Williams (pictured above), who has somehow managed to outlive cohorts Ike Turner and Nathaniel Mayer. The return of Germany-Canada garage rock duo King Khan & BBQ on Nov. 10th. Japanese cuties Shonen Knife (Nov. 11th) and legendary New Zealanders the Axemen (Nov. 9th). The unlikely, yet oh-so-perfect pairing of Dexter Romweber and Charlie Louvin on Nov. 21st. And, last-but-not-least, homecoming gigs from the like of Harlan T. Bobo (Nov. 25th) and the Reigning Sound (Nov. 14th).

With upcoming Minglewood Hall dates by Neko Case, Son Volt, and Dan Auerbach (Nov. 4th, 17th, and 20th, respectively), this bests even the typical spring influx of touring acts heading to and from SXSW.

Finally breaking into the Top Ten with three sprawling somewhat-personal album picks and an all-hip-hop singles list.

12.

This epic album from the Wu-Tang Clan's greatest MC artist comes at you in movements. In the first third, Ghostface proves he can spin gripping drug-trade yarns better than any new jack while never once trying to convince you he didn't long ago rise above that world. The middle third is pure show-off: Luther Ingram-sampling endorsement of child abuse Ghost remembers as good parenting, Willie Hutch-driven battle of the sexes, explosive Pete Rock-produced rave-up. The final third he goes all "Old Jeezy" on us, bringing deep-soul wisdom and moral center to a newly resurgent subgenre (coke-trade rap) desperately in need of it. Throughout, you get a dense collection of grimy crime stories, offbeat boasts and exhortations ("Y'all be nice to the crackheads!"), soaring '70s soul samples, random bursts of reality (our hero opens one song kicked back at the crib watching Larry King Live), and extravagant production that splits the difference between Bomb Squad and Kanye West. If you're not a pretty serious hip-hop fan, you might struggle to find a point of entry. If you are a pretty serious hip-hop fan, you can get lost in it. Thirteen years after the debut of the posse classic Enter the Wu-Tang: 36 Chambers and 10 years too late, here's the best Wu-Tang album since the first one.

Sample Song: "The Champ"

• Mitch Easter

The headliner is alt-rock heavyweight Mitch Easter, whose rich varied career — from fronting indie cult band Let's Active to helming classic R.E.M. albums — is profiled in this week's paper by Andrew Earles. Setting the stage for Easter are a couple of local notables: The New Mary Jane pairs former Grifters partners Dave Shouse and Scott Taylor in a new form. And another signature early ’90s Memphis band, The Simple Ones, lead by Shangri-La Records owner Jared McStay, will also perform.

Memphis Pops starts at 6 p.m. and has been moved indoors due to our never-ending rain. It'll now take place in the back room at Earnestine & Hazel's, at 531 S. Main.

After being victim to the rain a few weeks ago, the Goner Records installment of the Downtown Alley Jams series has been rescheduled for next Wednesday, November 4th, in the Barbaro Alley near Main and Peabody. The show begins at 5:30 p.m. and will feature a packed triple bill of Mouserocket, Magic Kids, and Harlan T. Bobo.

Moving into the Top 15 and coming close to wrapping this little project up.

15.

The year's most beautiful record is a reunion album from this great Senegalese pop band of the '70s and '80s that has been accurately but insufficiently described as an Afropop Buena Vista Social Club. Co-produced by countryman and onetime spotlight-usurper Youssou N'Dour, this dispatch from the other end of the Afro-Cuban continuum is more commanding and more supple, led by guitarist extraordinaire Barthelemy Attisso and saxman Issa Cissokho.

Song Sample: "Bul Ma Miin"

Some more personal picks on the album list, sandwiched between the previous heavyweights and the coming heavyweights.

18.

It seems odd in a year so desperate — and desperately contentious — that there was so little music that acknowledged the colossal mess the world is in, as if all of pop music colluded to deal with it by dancing our troubles away. And there was no greater house party than Kish Kash. Brit DJs Basement Jaxx decided to make one thing we could all have when it all crumbles down, and they invited a jumbled assortment of friends — young rappers and old punks, second-tier teen-poppers and garage-rock soul belters, art-funk chanteuses and (literally) the girl next door — to help them do it. The result: the most ecstatic and warm-hearted party record in recent memory.

Song Sample: "Hot N' Cold"