Bob Dylan is almost too old to perform, Luciano Pavarotti just died, the six or seven major radio stations in every town are exactly the same and “artists” like Hannah Montana can sell out the Fort Worth Convention Center in a matter of minutes.Money and greed have taken their toll on the music business, and now there is more bad music than ever before.

So exactly where does this bad music come from?

Five multinational companies have monopolized the record industry.

This means that most records made, or at least the ones people actually know about, have to fit the criteria of what one of these five companies thinks will sell.

Bands that want to make money are forced to change their sound to fit the model of what sells. And that’s where bad music comes from.

Bad music also thrives on the radio.

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 removed limits on how many stations a single company can own.

So now two companies, Clear Channel Communications and Infinity Broadcasting, own the major stations in most cities.

These two companies don’t really have any obligation or incentive to promote local artists, and as a result, a lot of good music isn’t getting exposed as well as it could.

People just got too good at making money off of music.

Record companies and radio stations know that taking risks on artists that sound different from what is selling is a bad business move.

For people who really care about and appreciate good music this is heartbreaking. Granted they don’t have to listen to the sea of over-commercialized music out there, but it’s cultural pollution.

It’s an exploitation of art.

The Baby Boomers grew up hearing Bob Dylan tell them how “the times, they are a-changing,” and their children heard bands like Rage Against The Machine scream, “You’ll never silence the voice of the voiceless.”

Now there is Hannah Montana spouting off lines about how she’s “got the best of both worlds.”

But don’t worry too much.

Nobody can really hear what she’s saying with all the high-pitched 15-year-old girls screaming.

Alex Zobel is a senior news-editorial journalism major from Albuquerque, N.M.