Written like a true music afficionado my friend !! There is plenty truth and insightful observations in what you wrote ....

• But what quality is for me, is for someone else garbage and vice versa. Quality is very subjective. Music taste is also very subjective.*

Spot on... and although I am ADAMANT that there is such a thing as lousy / crap music ... is that relevant if the artist finds fulfilment in producing it... or if some other folk get pleasure in listening to it?

Still today I sometimes struggle with the fact that hardly any club or festival I go to, touches my heart deeply. The music isn't doing it for me. The atmosphere isn't what it was. I sometimes long for what Techno was in the 90s, the first decade of my Techno era

Has it perhaps dawned on you that you are no longer in that 'space'...in maturity, emotionally, life experience? Just wondering. I believe we subtly change all our lives and because we are living that life in chronological increments we do not feel or sense the changes (you know the frog in the slowly heating water {grin})

This 'artist' you are talking about reminds me very much of another female artist from decades ago... to my mind not mega talented musically but she marketed herself amazingly, using what resources she had to maximum effect... and she got what she richly deserved... a successful career... you might have heard of her ... Madonna