There are many factors that have had their influence, and why they "Golden Age" of any kind of music is gone. The artists are still here. There's so much great new music being released all the time, it's just not getting out there for people to hear.
If you look at the current state of radio, and media in general, it has all been gobbled up by monopolies. There are no more major market free form radio stations. We had five at one point in Boston. Now, we have one Classic Rock station owned by CBS Broadcasting, and several other talk, sports, religion, and "adult hit" owned by the same company. Then there are the Murdoch owned stations, Westinghouse, and so on. Fortunately, we have many college and community stations that play independent record labels and artists. Unfortunately, many places are not as lucky as we are.
Next is all the streaming services. People cherry-pick their playlists on services such as pandora and spotify. These services don't pay the artists their royalties. More of people wanting stuff without paying for it, even though you have to pay to have the service commercial free. Then play lists are picked because someone only likes one particular thing, and they will find you stuff that sounds the same.
Then speaking of labels, independents are trying to push a lot of new music. They are doing a great job. Many of their rosters will fill large clubs or theatres. That is saying a lot now that we're in an age that a cover band will pack a club one night, then the same club will have three great original bands the next night and they're playing to twenty people, the bartenders, and the bartender's dog. People have lost any sense of adventure. They want it prepackaged and what they're used to. Just like the old time record labels. They are use to a business model that's gone. The labels and clubs no longer try to cultivate bands and artists for careers. If they don't fill a club first night or sell X number of albums with no promotion or support, they'll never play there again. That, and major labels dropped the ball in nineties, and couldn't figure out how to still make money for themselves and the musicians as the digital age was taking over. The indies are trying to save great music, but can't do it alone.
Which is a shame. There are some great bands and artists, especially in the Americana, Folk, Stoner, and Garage genres these days. There are even a lot of great Psych bands, as that genre is making a comeback. They are all phenomenal musicians, artists, and writers deserving to be household names. And there are some incredible producers putting out top notch records with these folks. It's just that they can't make a living by being played only on WMBR, WZBC, WFUV, WMSE, KPIG, and KZSC.
If you can find great bands and artists that you like, find their Bandcamp page. Buy their merch. On Fridays, Bandcamp doesn't charge the artists, and gives them 100% of the money from their sales. Look up their label, see what other bands are on the roster. Go see them live, buy their merch when they're on the road. Maybe their music will eventually get played on the one pseudo rock station in your city if their numbers look appealing enough to the marketing people at the radio stations for selling advertisement. If you're going out with friends, and want to go check out some music, go see original artists and boycott the cover bands making money off of other peoples' work and your lack of imagination.
I'm really glad to see that vinyl is starting to come back (even if it is absurdly expensive right now). As mentioned before, there's something about flipping through records, and finding something you like. Then the drive home wanting to play it. And finally, when the needle hits the groove, and you're looking over the artwork and reading the liner notes on a 12" square album cover. There were many nights after seeing a great band, I drove home with a record (or cd) and a T-shirt on my front seat dying to be able to check everything out better.
Now i have to buy Serious Radio for 6 months, so we can listen to Classic Rock while we drive to the trailer and travel around .
