Best National Act/Male Vocalist

Beck

It's no surprise to find Beck among the Best Music Poll national winners. It's not even terribly surprising to see him finishing first in more than one category: Best National Act and Best National Male Vocalist. A perennial favorite since '94, when he unleashed "Loser" on the world, Beck went on to become alternative rock/pop's can-do man for the latter half of the '90s. And even though he got a bit of a late start and never had the mass cultural impact of a Kurt Cobain, he'd have made a pretty good candidate for Artist of the Decade by the end of the '90s. After all, who else covered as much relevant stylistic terrain -- everything from the hillbilly hip-pop of "Loser" to the lo-fi indie-folk bloose of One Foot in the Grave (K); from the old-skool white b-boy moves of Odelay (DGC) to the surprisingly straightforward organic guitar pop of Mutations (DGC).

He followed all that up in the past year by getting jiggy with the slow jam in his own loverman way and embracing contemporary soul slinging on Midnight Vultures (DGC). You could say that in his unwillingness to stick to any one genre, he's invented something of a new genre. Or perhaps a new, postmodern conception of the artist as the (s)avant-garde master dabbler who unironically embraces any and all styles of music with such ease and enthusiasm that the listener can't help imagining an ironic distance between the singer and the song.

-- Matt Ashare