These are some of the most prominent purveyors of World Music, but there are dozens, if not hundreds, more small, local, and specialty labels that are dedicated to making available the sounds of the human race. I wanted to share these five with you, not only because of their range and accessibility, but also because they have the resources and the vision to offset the exploitation that World Music artists have long endured at the hands of the record industry.

IMP celebrates the end of its first year of social networking with a unique gift to itself: year-end lists comprised of members' own Top Tens. Given that IMP has more than 1,200 members from 30 countries, an easy hypothesis was that the list would be populated by obscure jewels from around the world. However, the driving force behind IMP has always been recontextualization over willful obscurity, so there should be no surprise that these lists are dominated by albums and singles that were just barely left of the mainstream. If anything, we find that indie rock now means more to more people than ever, even in the absence of any truly groundbreaking work this year. So, please enjoy a trip down memory lane to the year that was 2007.

In the waning hours of Stylus’s light, I realized how strong my relationship had become with what seemed little more than a pop page at the time. Would I have ever realized the extent of my affection for the site and its writers had Stylus continued to exist? No, I would have continued taking it for granted, cursing the reviews that countered my own feelings, peeking in periodically during work hours to keep an eye on fellow commenters, and slinging barbs and ill-formed ideology to elucidate chinks in every feature and editorial...

If there is a hell, it must resemble the seventh grade school experience—vicious and seemingly eternal. School is hell for twelves, and no place better illustrates man's inhumanity than a middle school cafeteria. Menomena's video for "Rotten Hell" captures this specific agony perfectly...

Outside of the club that night, cut off by publicists left and right, I finally conquered the queue and made my way through the doors, where I sort of expected to see Amy front and center, on stage, singing her heart out for the realest fans. Amy wasn't there quite yet, but an open bar was standing in for her. Signs reading her name were everywhere, but there was no sign that the lady would even make an appearance. Heck, the bar wasn't even playing her album...

I like to think I helped make it a little more acceptable (or at least a little less ridiculous) for someone way past 30 to listen to new or even objectionable music unironically and with no intention of 'just trying to relate, dude' at full volume in traffic. My dubious parenting skills aside, it occurred to me that there are more and more adults who offend their own children with their musical choices. Isn't it supposed to be the other way around?

What's most interesting about Lidell and his ilk, however, is not the unifying themes of their oeuvre, but the things it lacks. Generally speaking, where's the celebration, hope, and sense of community and liberation that arises from classic soul music? Many of black music's white practitioners are full of the angst, doubt, recrimination, and regret that seems better suited to Joy Division and The Smiths than to Al Green and Aretha Franklin...

What came spontaneously was a 15-minute din that was later edited into a 40-second slap in the face, which we were delighted to hide at the back of the LP. The plan took its inspiration from an old Chinese proverb: "Get all your enemies gathered together, and when they are laughing free from any care run up behind them with large sticks of bamboo and batter them..."

My 2007 South by Southwest experience is finally underway. Honestly, I wait all year to hit Austin for just four days, so it's tough to not spend several weeks before it just fanticizing about breakfast tacos, free beer, and more swag than even my monkey arms can carry. And the rock! Don't even get me started on all the music. Wait, this is a blog, so, yes, maybe I should get on to the talk of what I did today...

Indie-rockers may not have been the world's best musicians, but they seemed genuine. Unlike my New Kids-obsessed friends in the '80s, the people I knew in high school valued the entire rock album over the pop singles on which I had previously relied. I listened to Up To Here by Ontario's The Tragically Hip so much that I had to replace my cassette more than once.

Visit a Phish message board today, and two things continue to link the community: a sincere appreciation for Phish's music and everything it brought into the lives of the Phans and a deep respect for any and all music that appeals to the mind, heart, and soul. Time will surely tell if the latter is still true of the mixtape community, if IMP's ever-growing membership hasn't already...

Crafting a new form of lit-rock, the Massachusetts-based DeGeorge brothers use two-minute pop-punk songs about the characters and themes from author J.K. Rowling's immensely popular Harry Potter series to encourage kids to be creative and keep reading. Think a new millennium They Might Be Giants focused on a single cultural touchstone...

Boy In Static is Boston-based multi-instrumentalist Alex Chen, known for allowing ambient noises—including the sounds of kids playing and church bells ringing—to drift through his windows and onto his tracks. His second full-length album, Violet, was just released in Japan by And Records and will be released in the U.S. on May 29 by Mush Records...

We brought recorders to parties, taped each other babbling incoherently during camping trips, and dubbed vocals from late-night infomercials, horrible talk shows, and our favorite movies. We spliced it all together using what we considered precision surgical tools—the pause button, jerry-rigged wires, and dual tape decks—and added the essential songs of the moment...

Geekiness in rock music falls into two basic categories: slightly obsessive and overly aware pop earnestness and self-obsessed, dork-turned-rockstar posturing. Both personas take up major page space in the rock 'n' roll history book and even have their own 1970s proto-punk forebearers in Jonathan Richman and Lou Reed...

I wasn't allowed to see the movie. But I was smack in the middle of the album's demographic. There were no warnings, no safety measures. The pop world was wide open to me, and I had the allowance to prove it. But the album was linked with an R-rated movie, and it was R-rated not for violence, but for sex. Nudity, sex, and, most importantly, sexuality...

Music has enriched and enlightened some of my most cherished moments. More specifically, I made a mixtape for a very special person a decade-and-a-half ago, which communicated some of my deepest feelings and captured the beauty and complexity of my relationship with my future wife...

During the past three years, I've been asked over and over why mixtaping is still relevant in a time of file-sharing and the reign of "Now That's What I Call Music". Simply put, mixtaping is one of the last standing monuments to popular music's longevity...