I'm going to go for Conor even though our upper echelon of folk favorites may be different prime. I've never been able to get the appeal of Elliott Smith myself. I respect him but I think the sound is too lazy (not in a musical creative sense but the mood) for me. He's got kind of a cool classic enchanting Simon and Garfunkel harmony thing going but I don't feel it.
I do know where you're coming from in terms of this. It took me a little while to really feel Elliott's music. It was years back when I started listening to him, but than I stopped, because I wasn't feeling the music too well. The past few months however, I learned through the years that I should try to focus on the lyrics more, and once I did that with Elliott Smith, I started to feel his music much better. People's opinions will always differ with him as an artist, so I completely understand where you're coming from.
Patrick Wolf I just heard for the first time because of this poll and he's got a different sound for folk. The brightest most jubilant feel of all the artist. Kind of has that dreary 80's voical though like a Morrisey type. I liked the second song you posted by him. Conor for me is probably the only artist here I'd buy material from though. He has a lot more of an alternative rock sound to his music and he has an edge the others don't. Folk can be pretty aggressive and I love when it goes there. When an artist is strumming that acoustic and building up to an epic climax in their songs it's musical Heaven. I've heard this in my fav by him "Road To Joy". I own his last album "The Peoples Key" and it was a good album! Conor gets my vote!
I absolutely agree with what you say about folk as a genre. It gives it a new feel when the vocalist of the group really puts some power into it. Conor Oberst is probably the one that does that phenomenally. Everything i've heard from him, has great delivery, and great lyrics.
For this poll though, I will go with Elliott, but Oberst takes a very close second.
