Grammy’s Chance to Smooth Things Out

Santana!

Let’s hope we hear that name often during the 42nd annual Grammy Awards ceremony on Feb. 23 at Staples Center in Los Angeles.

The alternatives are enough to make you shudder.

A perpetual criticism of Grammy voters is that they favor mainstream bestsellers over more adventurous, cutting-edge artists. That tendency works well in years when such quality artists as Stevie Wonder and U2 deliver hits, but it often results in honors for such conservative hit makers as Phil Collins and Celine Dion.

The danger this time around is that 1999 was an especially dreary time for artistry in the commercial mainstream.

If the voters go strictly by sales, the nominees for best album will be the Backstreet Boys’ “Millennium,” Britney Spears’ ”. . . Baby One More Time,” Ricky Martin’s “Ricky Martin,” Limp Bizkit’s ‘Significant Other” and Santana’s “Supernatural.”

If it weren’t for Santana, who’d want to even open that envelope?

With those bestsellers around, it’s easy to see why voters will rush to “Supernatural.”

“Supernatural”--which sold more than 4.5 million copies--isn’t the kind of commanding artistic statement that would have stood up well against several recent Grammy winners, including Lauryn Hill’s “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” and Bob Dylan’s “Time Out of Mind.”

But in this pop climate it is an attractive enough choice in several categories, from best album to best rock instrumental.

Here’s a look at nomination prospects in the Grammys’ three most high-profile categories. Nominations will be announced Tuesday.

Best Album

If there’s anything Grammy voters like better than mainstream bestsellers, it’s past winners or respected veterans.

Acknowledging the latter is a way of paying belated tribute to artists who were passed over by earlier Grammy voting classes. The most dramatic example was Dylan, who never won a Grammy in the ‘60s when he helped turn rock ‘n’ roll into a legitimate art form.

Carlos Santana, similarly, was never even nominated in the top categories in the ‘60s and ‘70s for his group’s most celebrated albums, including “Santana” and “Abraxas.” His only Grammy was for rock instrumental in 1988.

The other reason “Supernatural” is tailor-made for Grammy voters this year is that a victory for the Mexico native would help the academy acknowledge the growing presence of Latin music in the U.S. pop world.

The tough question is who else do you nominate?

Grammy credibility would take a serious hit if voters stuck with the sales list and nominated a bunch of the year’s teen faves or anonymous pop hit makers--from Spears and Christina Aguilera to Martin and Jennifer Lopez.

To avoid that kind of embarrassment, the academy changed the nomination process in 1995 to take the final decision out of the hands of the estimated 10,000 voters. A blue-ribbon screening committee makes the final choices in key categories from the Top 20 finishers chosen by the larger body.

Martin is the only one of the year’s five top sellers likely to get the committee’s blessing. “Ricky Martin” suffered from uninspired material, but Martin will surely be on the minds of voters because of his dazzling performance on last year’s Grammy telecast and because he proved to be a winning performer on his highly successful concert tour.

To round out the nominations, there is likely to be support for hip-hop trio TLC’s “FanMail” and the Nashville-based Dixie Chicks’ “Fly.” The albums were well-received by critics and sold more than 2 million copies each.

The groups also benefit from another Grammy tradition: Voters tend to stick with past winners.

TLC won two awards in 1995, and, more important, was nominated in the record of the year category for “Waterfalls,” where it lost to Seal’s “Kiss From a Rose.” In a major upset, the Chicks defeated Shania Twain last year in the country album category--and “Fly” is a major step forward for the country trio. The drawback for the Chicks is that Grammy voters rarely nominate country artists in this category.

Though academy insiders insist that the screening committee doesn’t aim for balance in the nominations the way a political party does with a presidential ticket, the nominations most years do seem to reflect some balance among genres. Besides mainstream pop and rock, there’s usually a critical favorite and some hip-hop or R&B.;

It’s hard to picture much rock representation on the final ballot this year because the top-selling acts, such as Limp Bizkit and Kid Rock, are hardly worthy of consideration at this level.

Don’t look for a critical favorite to make it this year either. Beck--who was nominated in this category three years ago for “Odelay”--would probably get a nomination for the dazzling new “Midnite Vultures,” but it was released after the eligibility period, which ended Sept. 30. Two other critical favorites--Moby’s “Play” and Nine Inch Nails’ “The Fragile,” are eligible, but they probably didn’t sell enough to show up on the Grammy voters’ radar screen.

Past Grammy winners Whitney Houston, Celine Dion, Mary J. Blige and Alanis Morissette are all back with new albums, and one may emerge with a nomination.

And then there’s another veteran who had a huge presence last year. Would you believe Cher?

Stranger things have happened.

So it’s Santana and Martin as odds-on favorites, with everyone else fighting it out for the remaining spots.

Best Record

Santana!

Yes, you can feel the sweep building.

“Smooth,” the Santana track featuring a vocal by Matchbox 20’s Rob Thomas, has a lock on a nomination. The single was one of the year’s Top 10 sellers and is the kind of smoothly crafted work Grammy voters embrace.

Another sure thing is Martin’s “Livin’ La Vida Loca.” It, even more than the Martin album, was what Rickymania was all about last year. Though the novelty single has suffered from overexposure, it is more admired by industry pros than you’d think--and could even end up defeating “Smooth” in the final voting.

Cher’s “Believe” is a major contender because it was the biggest-selling single of the year, and a nomination would be a sort of career achievement nod.

TLC’s “No Scrubs” and Destiny’s Child’s “Bills Bills Bills” were two of the year’s most high-profile hits, and they had more character and vitality than most 1999 records.

The other possibilities are led by past winners Houston and Mariah Carey. But both singers had two or more singles on the eligibility list, which could divide the votes of their supporters. Madonna, a Grammy outsider for most of her career, was embraced by voters last year, when she picked up three awards, and her eligible “Beautiful Stranger,” a track on the “Austin Powers” soundtrack album, was an especially affecting work. But it’s a longshot because it wasn’t released as a formal single.

The pop-rock possibilities are pretty diverse, and all are longshots: Sugar Ray’s melodic “Every Morning,” Everlast’s “What It’s Like” and the Offspring’s “Pretty Fly (for a White Guy).”

If the committee does turn to the young pop brigade, the most likely choice is the Backstreet Boys’ “I Want It That Way.” In country, Twain has three songs eligible, but she had her chance last year. The Dixie Chicks’ “Ready to Run” will probably get the Nashville vote.

Put your money on Santana, Martin and Cher--and then wait for some surprises.

Best New Artist

Santana!

Well, not really.

The eligibility provisions for this category--which this year has more than 500 entries--are so flexible that some artists have made it onto the ballot even though they’ve been making albums for more than a decade. Still, I doubt that the rules committee can find a way to make Santana eligible.

That means the lightweight teen favorites may find a big opening here. After all, the voters can say the artists are young and they may get better. The RCA and Columbia labels are already touting their new young stars Aguilera and Jessica Simpson, respectively, as the new Mariah Carey.

Other high-profile newcomers include Spears, Kid Rock, Lopez, Lou Bega and Limp Bizkit.

Shudder.

The ones to root for: rapper Eminem, a bestseller whose shock-rap style may be too extreme for Grammy voters, and Macy Gray, the classy R&B; singer whose “On How Life Is” was the best debut album of the year.

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Robert Hilburn, The Times’ pop music critic, can be reached by e-mail at robert.hilburn@latimes.com.