Wide appeal.
Oh.
You mean there are no gate keepers anymore with the power to restrict what gets heard. And you, like many others on this thread regard that as a horrible state of affairs. No more herd experience. Individualism = bad, herd = good.
I am glad where you are sad.
I will buy as much Celtic music as I desire not just the few expensive imports I can get Green Linnet to ship me. I will buy albums from obscure Swedish reggae bands and a song here and there from Russian house bands. If I can hear an album from some local band in Boston or Witchita online and buy a song or two.
Years ago, I used to go to a local food and bluegrass festival. They had Texas fiddle competitions and chili cookoffs. One young performer that used to play became famous (and lost a lot of baby fat) - Allison Krause. She is good. But Erika Chambers is just as good despite not being famous. In yesteryear it wouldn’t have been possible for me to find or buy her music.
Nope. I don’t miss the power of yesterday’s corporate gatekeepers restricting what music and even what types of music were available. And I don’t long for.some.corporate decision making cowboy to round me up and drive me to what music is financed by the record manufacturers, and carried in the limited shelfspace of brick and mortar stores.
Aside from the old-school business of Rock, there were some very talented musicians, writers and performers.
It’s hard to argue with a Pink Floyd, and one’s Stones must Roll. Blind Faith is Creamy, not unlike Strawberry Fields Forever.
I don't know where you're getting the bit about "gate keepers" from. It doesn't have much to do with what I was talking about.
For better or for worse pop music and rock music was a generational thing. It brought people together in what snarky critics would call a "mass" way. That's what it did and what it was.
You could still listen to your bluegrass and Celtic music, but pop hits had a way of defining or describing or characterizing an era. They provided a common "culture" for people who were very different in other ways. That was a big reason why people turned to pop or rock music. For the most part that's gone now.
Imagine if our modern listening habits had been around in the past. So instead of pursuing their traditional folk music our ancestors had each been walled away with their own particular music, rap, or ska, or what have you. Would it have been a good thing? Would something have been lost? I don't know, but the question goes deeper than your dismissal does.
There have always been independent labels, and if need be bootlegs, that provided a wide variety of music to people. Cult groups and singers have been around for a long time. What's lost is the sense of community and belonging that popular music once created. If that very idea of commonality threatens your sense of your own individuality even in its absence, maybe your individuality wasn't that robust to begin with. Touché, mon vieux.