Is the current state of mainstream music fading? Some may hope so.

It seems that many pop “musicians” have left their own vocal dance groups to do their own solo projects, focusing on playing music that has more substance, only to find that they have very little of a clue of what substance is.

Case in point: Justin Timberlake. Justin’s latest solo single may make Glenn Frey want to step in the ring and re-make his solo comeback. (Remember “The Heat is On”?)

Some outside the industry say this and other signs have surfaced showing that boy band and dance music are on their way out. Some inside the industry are waiting for another bandwagon to arrive for them to jump on.

With every wave of inconsequential music that hits the airwaves and TV screens, follows a movement of sincere, expressive music that goes against the norm and inspires the world around it to do the same.

This is what rock 'n’ roll did when the phrase was first coined. Unfortunately, it hasn’t done this in nearly a decade. In recent years, our youth have been put through an undemocratic process of deciding what to listen to. In effect, whether they know/like it or not, someone else is deciding what’s going in their CD player.

Radio has become pre-programmed and record shelves have been stacked with glossy-packed bubble gum chosen by the suits. When first coined, r 'n’ r was played and enjoyed at the spur of a moment. Nowadays, it’s all pre-planned and marketed, leaving little room for anything of any type of consequence to surface.

Nonetheless, there’s still a lot of talent out there, on and off the radio. Pink, for instance, seems to constantly churn up hits with fire and passion. Of course, she also focuses on deviating from the norm.

Numerous hip-hop groups have exposed the country to a side of it many have turned their eyes away from in the past – the world of the inner city.

I’m not saying those in the music industry don’t work hard or what they do is inconsequential. However, any form of music throughout its history has been in its most potent state when the power was given to the artist to perform as he or she pleased. Artists from Buddy Holly to John Coltrane to Johnny Rotten all did things their way and were slow to let the integrity of what they recorded and what the listener received suffer.

Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Billie Holiday, Aretha Franklin, Robert Johnson, Count Basie and Pete Seeger were all discovered by a music exec, John Hammond, who allowed them to express themselves with little record company intrusion. His understanding of how an artist creates made him as an important a figure to music as any other name mentioned in this paragraph.

This type of relationship between an artist and record company still exists. But still, as I listen to what is on the radio, I can’t help but wonder how much of what the artist is saying verbally and musically was cleared by someone else before it was said.

Music execs need to step aside and see the beauty of music that is created from the heart and not from digital enhancement. It’s time for an artistic movement to take place where freedom is expressed and created through limitless and uninhibited music.

Let our youth learn the joy of independence from artists who are independent, not the sorrow of conformity from artists who conform.