But when the people don't want albums, what do we expect?
Today, we listen to music more than ever, but only those supported by a large audience really see any benefit from the streaming model. People just aren't spending the kind of money they used to on music, and it's affecting the music itself. [1] Years ago (for a solid 10-20 years) your average unsigned regional band could do well on CD sales alone. Yeah, it was up to them to make a good album, but the sale of 100 albums (which could easily happen over the course of one or two good nights), assuming 100% ownership could give the band $1,000-$1,300 to split. In retrospect now, they'd need about 1,800 downloads to achieve the same thing (Which people don't even really do anymore). Or ~70k-700k streams just to hit that same number. [2]
Ironically, I just heard of a Netflix suit suggesting something similar for movies[3]. I'd imagine if this was to happen, we'd see the same thing in Hollywood: a tightening of belts high up the food chain which may or may not affect A-list actors; but an otherwise decimation of the lower market. AMC has a nice quote (Although, they'd naturally be opposed to such a thing, so take it with a grain of salt): "...[the] price level is unsustainable and only sets up consumers for ultimate disappointment down the road if or when the product can no longer be fulfilled."
[1] https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/shrinknp_800_800/AAEAAQAAAAA... (I wish I could find something to 2016, but not a graphic like this)
[2] http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/how-muc...
[3] https://qz.com/1055032/netflix-for-cinemas-moviepass-wants-t...
I think what went wrong with music was the initial value set, and then competed with (into extinction) by Davids and Goliaths. Steve Jobs valued a song at $0.99 11 years ago. We've yet to adjust that for inflation. It's only gotten worse with valuations for streaming. The real problem now isn't that we don't listen to albums anymore (OK, maybe that's half the problem) or that we don't have physical music, but Steve Jobs valued it too low. And that a song that took $2,000,000 to produce costs the same as a song that took $0 to produce; yet both command a $0.99 price point.
I'm getting preachy, and I'm sorry.