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The Jimi Hendrix Experience's Valleys Of Neptune enters The Billboard 200 at #4,putting the rock legend back in the top five nearly 40 years after hedied at the tragically young age of 27. No other artist has cracked thetop five this long after his death. Elvis Presley is in second place. His Elvis:2nd To None debuted at #3 in October 2003, a little more than 26years after his death..

Hendrix is the second music legend to make the top five posthumously in the past two weeks. Johnny Cash bowed at #3 two weeks ago withAmerican VI: Ain't No Grave. But Cash died less than sevenyears ago. It's more remarkable for an artist who died four decades agoto make significant chart waves.

Valleys Of Neptune is, incredibly, Hendrix's 34th posthumous album to make The Billboard 200.

Hendrix was a star for just three years, from June 1967, when he played theMonterey International Pop Festival, to September 1970, when he died inLondon of a drug overdose. The guitar hero had four top five albums inhis lifetime. This is his third top five album since his death. Itfollows The Cry Of Love, which hit #3 in 1971, and CrashLanding, which reached #5 in 1975.

Four of Hendrix's catalog albums re-enter The Billboard 200 this week. 1967's Are You Experienced? bows at #44,followed by 1968's Electric Ladyland at #60, the 1997compilation First Rays Of The New Rising Sun at #63and 1968's Axis: Bold As Love at #67.

Experienced? first cracked The Billboard 200 on Aug. 26, 1967. It was onlythe 10th highest new entry of the week (!), opening at an unimpressive#190. The album took 59 weeks to reach its #5 peak in October 1968. Thisweek's debut of Valleys Of Neptune gives Hendrix a nearly41-1/2 year span of top five albums.

Ludacris lands his fourth #1 album with Battle Of The Sexes. It follows Chicken*N*Beer, The RedLight District and Release Therapy. This is the first rapalbum to top the chart since Jay-Z's The Blueprint 3 nearlysix months ago. It's Ludacris' seventh top five album in a row,discounting a 2005 collabo with DTP, LudacrisPresents...Disturbing Tha Peace.

Two songs from Ludacris' album are listed in the top 20 on Hot Digital Songs. Ludacris is alsofeatured on two big hits by other artists. He's helping out on Taio Cruz's "Break Your Heart," whichholds at #1 on Hot Digital Songs, and Justin Bieber's "Baby," which hold at #7."Break Your Heart" sold 202,000 copies this week, bringing itsthree-week total to 506,000.

Gorillaz's Plastic Beach debuts at #2 in both the U.S. and the U.K. The album sold112,000 copies in the U.S. More than half of those copies (62,000) weresold digitally, making this the week's #1 Digital Album. In the U.K.,the album debuts behind Boyzone's Brother.

Lady Antebellum's Need You Now dips from #1 to #3 on The Billboard 200, butholds at #1 for the seventh straight week on Top Country Albums. This isthe longest run at #1 for an album by a group since Eagles' Long Road Out Of Eden hadseven weeks on top in 2007. Setting aside Eagles, which was a pop-rockpowerhouse before it became a country favorite, this is the longest runat #1 for an album by a core country group since Dixie Chicks' Taking The Long Wayhad nine weeks on top in 2006-2007.

Next week, in addition to holding at #1 on Top Country Albums, Need You Now may wellreturn to #1 on The Billboard 200. It would be the first albumto have three separate runs in the top spot since Taylor Swift's Fearless. Countrysells and sells and sells.

Broken Bells' Broken Bells enters The Billboard 200 at #7. This is a projectby James Mercer of The Shinsand Brian "Danger Mouse" Burton, best known asone-half of Gnarls Barkley. Both of those acts had topfive albums. The Shins' Wincing The Night Away debuted at #2 inJanuary 2007. Gnarls Barkley's St. Elsewhere peaked at #4 inJuly 2006.

Lady Gaga's The Fame dips from #7 to #8. This is its 38th week in the top 10, the longest run in the top 10for the debut album by a female artist since Britney Spears' 1999 album ...Baby OneMore Time held tight for 50 weeks.

Song Scorecard: "Blame It" by Jamie Foxx featuring T-Pain tops the 2 million mark in paiddownloads this week. It's Foxx's first 2 million seller as a leadartist, though he was featured on KanyeWest's 2005 smash "Gold Digger," which has sold 2,793,000copies.

"Bedrock" by Young Money featuring Lloyd also tops the 2 million mark in paid downloads. The song is listed in the top 20 on Hot Digital Songs forthe 15th consecutive week. It climbed as high as #4.

Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours" tops the 5 million mark in paid downloads this week. Of the five songs that havesold 5 million digital copies, this low-key, folkie ballad is only onethat isn't squarely in the pop/dance/hip-hop center of contemporary popmusic. Mraz's song took 107 weeks to reach 5 million, longer than any ofthe other songs to have reached this mark. That's fitting in a way: Thegenial ballad, which Mraz has called his "happy hippie song," is in norush. "I'm Yours" was a Grammy finalist for Song of the Year a year ago.

Shameless Plug: This week marks the 65th anniversary of Billboard's first pop album chart. To mark the occasion, I have prepared a ChartWatch Extra revealing the top three albums in just about every categoryyou can think of. The blog stars such all-time legends as The Beatles, Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presleyas well as such less obvious, but still category-leading, names as Usher, M.C. Hammer and James Horner. Check it out on Friday.

Here's the low-down on this week's top 10 albums.

1. Ludacris, Battle Of The Sexes, 137,000. This new entry is the rapper's fourth album to reach #1. Threesongs from the album are listed on Hot Digital Songs, including "HowLow," which dips from #13 to #14, and "My Chick Bad" (featuring NickiMinaj), which jumps from #30 to #18.

2. Gorillaz, Plastic Beach, 112,000. This new entry is the animated band's second top 10 album in arow. 2005's Demon Days reached #6. Two songs from the albumare listed on Hot Digital Songs, topped by "Stylo" (featuring Mos Def and Bobby Womack), which vaults from #188 to#81.

3. Lady Antebellum, Need You Now, 105,000. The album drops to #3 after a total of three weeks on top. Twosongs from the album are listed on Hot Digital Songs. "Need You Now"dips from #5 to #6. "American Honey" jumps from #49 to #38.

4. Jimi Hendrix, Valleys Of Neptune, 95,000. This new entry is Hendrix's eighth top 10 album. The tally includes18,000 digital sales, which shows that Hendrix's appeal ismulti-generational, encompassing both old codgers who love those shinydisks and young moderns who do everything digitally.

5. Gary Allan, Get Off On The Pain, 65,000. This new entry is the country singer's fourth top five album in arow. Allan climbed as high as #3 with 2005's Tough All Over and 2007's Living Hard.

6. Sade, Soldier Of Love, 52,000. The former #1 album drops from #2 to #6 in its fifth week. "Soldier OfLove" from #151 to #188 on Hot Digital Songs.

7. Broken Bells, Broken Bells, 49,000. This new entry is the second top 10 album for both JamesMercer of The Shins andBrian "Danger Mouse" Burton, best known as one-half ofGnarls Barkley. More than half ofthese albums (27,000) were sold digitally. "October" enters Hot DigitalSongs at #148.

8. Lady Gaga, The Fame, 47,000. The album dips from #7 to #8 in its 72nd week. Six songs from the expandededition of the album are listed on Hot Digital Songs, including"Telephone" (featuring Beyonce), which jumps from #14 to #11, and"Bad Romance," which holds at #17.

9. The Black Eyed Peas, The E.N.D., 43,000. The former #1 album dips from #8 to #9 in its 40th week. This isits 27th week in the top 10. Four songs from the album are listed onHot Digital Songs, including "Imma Be," which dips from #3 to #5, and "IGotta Feeling," which holds at #20.

10. Blake Shelton, Hillbilly Bone, 28,000. The EP drops from #3 to #10 in its second week. "Hillbilly Bone"(featuring Trace Adkins) dips from #66 to #72 on HotDigital Songs.

Alice In Wonderland was #1 at the box-office for the second straight weekend. The Almost Alicesoundtrack is the top-selling soundtrack for the second week, though itdrops from #5 to #13 on The Billboard 200.

Four other albums drop out of the top 10 this week. Danny Gokey's My Best Days dropsfrom #4 to #16, Lifehouse's Smoke & Mirrorsplummets from #6 to #34, Raheem DeVaughn's The Love& War Masterpeace drops from #9 to #24 and Easton Corbin's Easton Corbindrops from #10 to #21.

Three Contemporary Christian albums are listed in this week's top 40. Passion's Passion Awakening debutsat #15, Chris Tomlin's See The Morningvaults from #82 to #38 and Demon Hunter's The World Is A Thorndebuts at #39. Tomlin's album, which was released in 2006, is thisweek's #1 Catalog Album, displacing Michael Jackson's Number Ones. SeeThe Morning is only the third non-holiday album to top the Catalogchart since Jackson's death last June. It follows Number Onesand the Beatles' Abbey Road.

The soundtrack to Crazy Heart vaults from #30 to #18, its highestranking to date. It's this week's #2 soundtrack. Ryan Bingham's recording of "The WearyKind," which won an Oscar for Best Original Song, jumps from #137 to #99on Hot Digital Songs.

Ry Cooder, who has been riding the charts since 1972, lands the highest-charting album of his career with acollaboration with the Chieftains, another act that datesback to the ‘70s. Their album, San Patricio, debuts at #38.Cooder's previous highest- charting album (either solo or with theall-star group Little Village) was Borderline,which hit #43 in 1981.

The original cast album from Andrew Lloyd Webber's new musical Love Never Dies debuts at #82. The show had its world premiere at theAdelphi Theatre in London on March 9. It's scheduled to open in New Yorkon Nov. 11. The show continues the story of Webber's 1987 blockbuster ThePhantom Of The Opera, which spawned the best-selling original castalbum in Nielsen/SoundScan history. The album has sold 4,949,000 copiessince May 1991, when the company began tracking sales for Billboard.Webber has been a chart presence for nearly 40 years, since the arrivalof Jesus Christ Superstar (which he wrote with Tim Rice) in November 1970.

The Notorious B.I.G.'s Life After Death topped the 5 million sales mark a week ago. The album wasreleased just two weeks after the rapper was shot to death in March1997.

The Hit Man: Taylor Swift's "Today Was A Fairytale" from Valentine's Day is just the latest in a longline of songs that were introduced in Garry Marshallmovies to reach the top 10 on the Hot 100. Others include Bette Midler's "Wind Beneath My Wings"from Beaches; Roxette's "It Must Have Been Love" and Go West's "King Of Wishful Thinking" from PrettyWoman; Marc Anthony's "You Sang To Me" from RunawayBride; and Kelly Clarkson's "Breakaway" from ThePrincess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement. And if you want togo way back, you can add Pratt & McClain's "Happy Days," fromthe long-running TV show that Marshall created. That's seven top 10hits, a track record that a lot of top artists would envy.

Battle Weary: Ludacris' Battle Of The Sexes is thesecond album with a title starting with the word "Battle" to top the Billboard200 in less than four months. It follows John Mayer's Battle Studies.These aren't the first albums that were ready for "Battle." Rage Against The Machine's The BattleOf Los Angeles topped the chart in 1999. Five For Fighting's The Battle ForEverything cracked the top 20 in 2004.

Heads Up: Marvin Sapp's Here I Am is expected to be next week's top new entry. The gospel album is expectedto sell in the range of 70,000 copies, which would probably put it inthe top five. Also due: Flobots' Survival Story, the White Stripes' live set UnderGreat White Northern Lights, Drive-By Truckers' The Big To-Do and Dropkick Murphys' Live On Lansdowne,Boston MA.