It is more than obvious that for some time now the quality of music has dramatically dropped. And we see this on a day to day basis with some of the songs that are being released. Songs that say things like “I’m in love with your body,” “I know you want it,” and so on are examples of the decline. These songs imply a lifestyle that could very well be hazardous to someone’s health and well-being.

We are beginning to see people in the industry trying to change all of this and get music back to what it was supposed to be, but what got it this way in the first place? Why is music going in this direction?

Is the industry copying what they see?

It is very possible that the music industry is just making music based off what they see in society. For example, there is a large problem with drug usage in this country. Perhaps the music industry wants to make songs that people can relate to and in return help up their sells? This leads to someone like Lil’ Wayne, Bruno Mars, or Ed Sheeran to write a song fully about getting high at a party. However, when we see this, we take it that these idols of ours are actually doing these things so we start to do it too.

Are we copying the music industry?

During your childhood you most likely had a desire to be like your favorite singer. Regardless of what they did, you wanted to do it too. This same principal may apply to the music industry. Say an artist like Drake writes a song about having sex with multiple women, and a young college kid that listens to this song may take it that Drake does this on a daily basis. Since Drake is this kid’s idol, he starts to try to become like Drake.

Is it just vicious a cycle?

The answer is simply, yes. It ends up just being a daily cycle of monkey see, monkey do. The industry sees us doing things, and they put it into a song. We hear that song, and it makes us believe that this is what we should be doing. It happens every time a new album is released in every genre of music.

So the big question is, how can we stop it?

The truth is, I am not sure how to stop the decline of quality music dead in its tracks. However, someone, somewhere needs to give. Should we? We could start trying to tell the industry what listeners want to hear and hope that they listen to us. Should it be the industry? They could actually decide that while the listeners matter, so does well-written music.

Whoever decides to give first, this writer just hopes it's soon.