I don’t necessarily think the music industry has declined as much as it has lost some of its relevance to some people and even some musicians. Especially with the internet. There is so much out there and so many ways for people to hear and experience great new music of all kinds whether released by a major industry record label or not. Imagine if Zappa was around today! I remember when Zappa was selling albums by mail order through cassette cd and record sleeves. You had to fill out a form and mail it somewhere with a check enclosed! I think he really would have liked YouTube and other platforms to get his music out.
Zappa (rightfully) had a major beef with the Parents Music Resource Center PMRC which he references at the end of the clip. The PMRC went under in the 90s I think and now we have Cardi B singing about her WAP. Which I think is awesome. I’ve never heard the song but it made a good meme. You don’t need to hide your satanic lyrics by backmasking anymore. Rob Halford was THE DEVIL back in the day, now he is more village people than Anton LaVey. The kardahians wear satanic and pagan symbology on their t shirts without realizing that kids were completely ostracized for liking slayer and Iron Maiden as recently as 30 years ago.
Subtle censorship and cancel culture is not something I am well versed in. I feel like there is danger there but I can’t put my finger on it (perhaps this is an illustration of how insidious it is). But I don’t think the PMRC would be too happy to see WAP get so much traction (so to speak).
