Has new music gone down the tubes?

@stuartk 

"It would be unfair to say that there is no good new music. Just as it would be unfair to say that all music from the 60’s and 70’s was worth listening to."

I'm 67 and I started with this sentence with the hope that readers would understand that I wasn't making a blanket statement about all modern music, but merely my opinion of music as a whole.

Obviously you missed that point and felt the need to reiterate my opinion in different words.

"Good music is good music, regardless of the decade and today’s good music amply displays all of the attributes you list above."

thanks @dabel

It’s painfully obvious to me that people, at one time, got to live in a world where the simple act of turning on the radio, or going to any movie theater, yielded a far greater likelihood of experiencing something good than the people of today experience doing the same stuff.

Money. That’ll do it.

Whether it’s,

A) some particular thing (Auto-Tune, comic book movies) showing corporate executives an opportunity for massive profits, thusly causing said corporations to exploit that thing ad nauseam to the great detriment of prioritizing new/innovative/challenging ideas, or 

B) a new/innovative/challenging idea that was funded ultimately yielding significant financial losses for a corporation, thusly causing corporations (the gatekeepers of the masses’ exposure to exciting popular art) to cease any further funding of new/innovative/challenging ideas and thusly reinforcing the purely-commercial motivations described in point A).

I’m fully aware that, in terms of popular music, there were inherent flaws in the system as far as artists were concerned in the past, and that, while streaming provides paltry remuneration for artists today, we are witnessing what may be a very positive change in how artists may gain exposure and commercial viability.

Nonetheless, a gross saturation of incredibly derivative and formulaic work is what defines mainstream popular music and film today, and I think it is obvious that this is of greater dominance in aggregate than ever before.

None of this means that there aren’t awesome artists out there representing the antithesis of everything stated above, merely that “rising to the top” seems to be harder than ever before.

You can listen to the radio on your Mcintosh sound system in your Grand Wagoneer on 23 speakers in Dolby Atmos, now if you can only find a decent station on FM LOL

vs you could turn on the radio in your clunker in 1971 and more than half of the songs being played back then are still being played today:

The progress in music has been continuous since the cave man, although at a greater pace. Each generation identifies with stuff they grew up on. Each generation has some really great music to add.

I grew up, basically on The Beatles —-> rock of the early 70’s. I loved music. I became a Geologist… worked by myself and music was my companion. I found fussion jazz… then traditional jazz, then classical, then before I started traveling the globe extensively world, then electronic. I would dive into each and be overwhelmed with some of the best of their tine. After some thirty years or so, I rediscovered Rock. I found there were many great bands. I was later surprised to find some amazing and exceptional Hip-Hop and world fusion.

I now listen to streaming…. Which sounds as good as vinyl on my system. I find incredible new music from here and there all over the world. A great example is the Afro-Celt Sound System. While not recent… this kind of fusion goes on everywhere and with increasing frequency.

The increase in availability of great new music is unreal.

I think any indicators pointing to less great new music are flawed by looking at too narrow a selection of channels.