* Arrangements are consistently built on samples and reconstructions of older songs. Big productions regularly credit a dozen people as songwriters: a Top 40 production is a factory process. * Awareness for new acts is built with fewer "big break" moments, and more of a grind with high-energy guerrilla marketing, endless tours, etc. Inclusion in a soundtrack is a common success milestone. * Live performance takes the form of: DJ set with a few vocal/instrumental parts, idol dance routine, acoustic cover - aiming to perform with a live performer on every part is the exception for acts driven by their production, though of course you still see traditional styles represented as a full live group. * 100's of amateur covers, "dance remix" and "nightcore" versions filter out over Youtube, Soundcloud and parts unknown. The sound gets curated by these fan groups leading to innumerable niches each with their own "canon text".
It really stopped being about the gear, and is only to a limited degree about mastery of traditional technique:"the sound" is always a commodity. But the brand is also more than the sound, and popular acts always get their branding on point now, which does include whatever aspects of the performance are necessary for "authentic" portrayal. Music is more than ever a tapestry with increasing extremes of "big heads" - constructed formulas - and "long tails" - folk vernaculars.
Is that really true, though? Most of the music that dominated the 90s, for example, wasn't created in the 90s. Grunge and Punk started in the 80s and were repackaged for mass consumption later.
The monopoly on what constituted "pop music" was largely destroyed by the turn of the century. That's part of the reason there is no particular sound of the '00s and '10s. I'm sure there was a lot of experimenting that's happened in the last 20 years, but they aren't being repackaged for mass consumption anymore.
Ironically, this has made the process of finding new music both easy and, at the same time, extremely difficult. As an indie game maker, I'm sure you can relate to the "discovery" problem.
That is not true today ... is it? Any examples?
By the mid-1990s we had a very clear idea of what 80s music was (electric guitar, synth and rap) and even what 90s music was (grunge and all this electronic stuff that I thought was super boring but a lot of people liked so whatever). It’s 2018 ... I have no idea what 2000s music was. Everyone can probably name a bunch of musicians that were big then, but what sound was being pioneered? Messing around with vocoders / harmonizers? That seems very limited and small.
What is the sound of 2010s music? I have simply no idea.