I don't consider myself biased or elitist either. I simply put it on a par of cinema in terms of say Michael Bay. I'm not even knocking popular music. Most popular music was good or better in most of the 1900's. However after the early 90's alt movement, I think popular music took a huge dive into shitty boy bands, singers, and bad hip-hop. Though the 70's-80's disco era was horrible in terms of popular music.

My point is most of the bad music of the last ten or so years is enjoyed on a shallow basis. A friend of mine listens to the new hits, and tosses off past musicians as "old." Anyone who considers a song from the 90's, or last year "old" is an idiot to me. Most people from my experience are judging music in terms of materialism and "what's hot."