....older artists and older music is still selling, according to Amazon.
To older people.
Kids are listening to more music than ever before, much of it new stuff and a lot of it far beneath the radar of the major record labels. Thanks to the ability to cheaply produce an entire album, inexpensive silk screening processes, photoshop, and webpages, a lot of bands are eeking out a subsistance living as musicians.
True enough, but a far cry from the free market developing America's music (think Sun Records). The music industry is dead. Record labels are dying. Maybe someday it will return to the freedom in which it was born.
BTW, if a home-spun band created a Sgt. Pepper etc, it would still rise to prominence. There are few new bands that produce unique new music (more of a blending of what has come before). I do like Audio Slave and a few others.
Being a musician, I can state that with some integrity. The music scene sucks (outside of Jazz, Blues, old Mowtown redux and geezer rock). Yes, I am a geezer!
LLS
A guy I work with runs a side business with his wife doing artwork and reprinting of CDs for regional bands. It's hundreds and two hundreds. I guess if the band "makes it" they would sign up with a label.