CREED'S PRAYERS COME TRUE

Retailers have been petitioning for divine intervention this Q4, and it looks like Wind-up's Creed is the answer to at least some prayers. With a little help from the man upstairs—and we don't mean Santa Claus—the boys remained at the top of the HITS Top 50 album chart this week.

"Creed continues to rack up amazing sales. They will remain near the top well into 2002," said AEC One-Stop Group's Tony Bazemore, who figured that out without consulting a calendar. "And the second week for Now Vol. 8' proved that the blockbuster franchise continues."

Island Def Jam's streak of gigantic Q4 debuts continues, with Def Jam South/IDJ's Ludacris bowing at #3, boasting sales over 300k. The week's other Top 10 bow is J Records' Busta Rhymes at #7. That would be J's fourth Top 10 debut album since Clive invented the imprint.

"This time of the year has proven to be great for rap records, and Ludacris and Busta are no exception. They trended up through the weekend, which was great," said Bazemore, whose knowledge of trends includes pet rocks and macrame.

There's more spirit of the season from UTV's seasonal spirit, "Now Xmas," climbing 8-5, joining another "Now" compilation, Virgin's "Now Vol. 8," which remained at #2.

Next week, the excitement gets greater as greatest hits from Priority/ Capitol's Ice Cube, Arista's OutKast and Columbia's Mariah Carey join new sets from Elektra's Nate Dogg, Atlantic's Fat Joe and Universal Mack 10 and a remixed Limp Bizkit.