Music got commoditized.

In the 90s the good bands got lucky that their distributors picked them up and promoted them etc. You just don't remember the amount of crap that was on at any given point in time.

Today you have instant access to millions of songs around the world in every genre imaginable: https://everynoise.com/ And not just to the whatever few records your local store carried, or what the Big Four paid the radio stations to promote.

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computerdork 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

I do agree that youtube has made it much easier to self-promote, and that today's model has replaced the old one and is doing decently. Still, the at least by the numbers, the music industry is still smaller than it used to be. Unfortunately, money is a powerful resource, and it's not like the music industry took everything and completely screwed over the musicians. They helped struggling musicians survive, giving them a chance to make it, while taking care of a lot of the non-music-related tasks that are actually very time consuming - promotion, lining up performances, lining up interviews, learning the successful strategies for giving a band a chance to succeed, networking... It is really another job in itself and is very difficult.

Labels still do this today, but it's just the number of opportunities for musicians is smaller.

Although, again, do agree that youtube (and somewhat spotify from what I've heard) has made a huge difference. I've heard a few times that Youtube is probably one of the best resources for self promoting music, but being good at making videos on youtube is not easy to do well and is also another job in itself.

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troupo 3 days ago | parent [-]

> I do agree that youtube has made it much easier to self-promote

And Spotify. And Apple Music, to an extent. And even SoundCloud.

> They helped struggling musicians survive, giving them a chance to make it,

Survivorship bias. You're completely ignoring the artists that never got the attention of distributors, or got immediately dropped, or dropped after the first disappointing (by studio standards) sales, or screwed out of revenue and royalties, or...

Or those who never got a chance at all because Sony or Warner paid radio stations to promote who they wanted to promote: https://www.npr.org/2005/11/23/5024411/warner-agrees-to-sett...

> Labels still do this today, but it's just the number of opportunities for musicians is smaller.

Labels still do this to the same extent as before. They spend about as much money and, percentage wise, keep as much money as before. It's even easier for them because a whole layer of physically printing and distributing media (tapes and CDs) is gone.

And the number of opportunities for artists increased, but became more complex.

In 2012 an otherwise unknown outside South Korea artist reached a billion views on Youtube resulting in worldwide tours. Now there are millions of unknowns on the same platforms. It's never been easier to promote your art, and it's never been more complex because there are so many others.

	▲	computerdork 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Don't disagree, but am realizing, it's easy to say anything (on my side too) without any proof either way. Yeah, have to admit, don't have any numbers on the total number of artist that are supported by music labels, or the total amount of money they give out. The only numbers I have are that the music industry's revenue crashed in the 2000's, down to nearly half, and only recently has it recovered and is near what it was it its peak in the 90's (but this is without inflation). To me at least, this means the amount of money in the industry has to give out is much lower. Although yeah, you do have a point that it doesn't take as much money to distribute music. That is definitely a cost savings for musicians and labels (and, as you probably know, DAW's and relatively cheap, high-quality recording equipment have been huge too). Still, not sure how big an effect these are though. And for me, yeah, can't have surviorship bias, because I've been struggling myself for years to make a living, haha :) But part of it is my fault, am trying to be a composer, and this is one of the worst jobs in the music industry to make money in. But yeah, do agree that it's well known that labels have screwed over tons of musicians over the past 100 years. Still, at the same time, it's probably a bell curve in terms of those that get screwed vs those that are supported and nurtured. And to me at least, the more money in the system, the more opportunities for good labels to support musicians.

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paradox460 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Always been the case. I have a late boomer early Gen x friend, who will insist that music was better back in the day, and that everyone was listening to Zeppelin and such, and nothing else. You can pull up the billboard charts for any year he waxes about and read off the top n, and rarely if ever find a track from the bands he claimed "everyone listened to."

Survivorship bias is and always has been real. If you don't believe me, think about the last time you heard Tubthumping from Chumbawumba on the radio or in a commercial

	▲	computerdork 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Don't disagree with that survivorship bias isn't real, everyone thinks the music of their time was the best. Still it's not the only factor at play here, because the music industry was in crisis in the early 2000's and its revenue dropped in half. That is a huge drop, and the less money in the industry, the smaller the pie that goes towards all types of projects, from Tubthumping to Smashing Pumpkin's Rocket. But do agree that most of the 90's was still pop music (just looked at through the top 100, forgot about most of those groups:)
	▲	ndriscoll 3 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Are you talking about the billboard hot 100 (singles)? The billboard 200 (albums) seems like what you might expect. e.g. I believe Led Zeppelin never had singles but they had 2 number one albums in 1970. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_200_number-o...

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computerdork 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Btw, finally checked out the Every noise at once site, wow, awesome! Great way to find new music!