I’m not disputing any of that, really. Especially your third point I believe is very important, but I also consider that a direct result from recorded music being essentially worthless. Artist have to gig more and sell other stuff to make a profit.
I'll come onto the point about whether music is any more worthless now in a moment, but first I'll just say that I agree that it's harder for most artists to make a living from recorded music, and that making money from touring and merch is partly a response to that. However, it only works because people are willing to pay for them, which they are - more than ever in fact. And it's not like you can disentangle it and try and claim that the music has no value, it's the merch that has the value - the only reason people are willing to pay for the merch or concert tickets is because of the music. So I guess that's my first thought on whether music is worthless now.
My second thought is back to my previous posts - the fact that recorded music makes as much money now (in real terms) as it did in the 70s and 80s. As many of us have said previously, the reason it's harder for most musicians to make a living now is that there are so many more musicians now. But, to talk in economic terms, just because there's been a huge surge in the supply of music it doesn't mean the demand should necessarily increase. Maybe demand (in financial terms) will continue to increase as it has for the past 5 years or so and people will pay more and more for subscription services and it will become more lucrative for musicians, hard to say what will happen, but as things are right now the pie isn't any smaller than it was, there are just more people able to make and release music so they each get a smaller slice of that pie.
I’ve see several of my favourte bands being absolute on point with their merchandise gamethe last couple of months especially, which is good to see. It’s sad though that bands can’t seem to get by with just their main craft, which should be selling music (or bringing live music to people).
It also depends on what you consider music to be; is recorded music merely a vehicle and live music the actual experience? Or should recorded music be an experiece in itself, one that’s worth paying for?
Let's turn that thought around - what's the purpose of making music? Is it to make money? Or is it to create something that means something to the artist and hopefully speaks to other people? I kind of agree with Stadler that it's worth considering the difference between art and commerce. When more of the money was made directly from selling recorded music, they were probably impossible to disentangle, and I imagine that probably played a part in why label/management interference in the music itself was so extensive. It might be coincidence, but there's much less studio/management interference in the music these days.