Doug, you keep missing the point I made earlier that is not supply of music that is limited, but demand. There might be gazillions of new bands, alright, but by your own admission, "no one has ever heard of" them. And no one has ever heard of those bands, because most people resources devoted to music (money and time) are finite and they are being absorbed, for the most part, by the Britney-like crap. In other words, the supply side of music business is doing fine - but it is the demand side that is getting, uhm, more and more monochromatic.
Wojtek