I've considered that this is true as well, but since I am extremely unfamiliar with pop music since the early 90s, I assumed that could also be the case as well

I've considered that this is true as well, but since I am extremely unfamiliar with pop music since the early 90s, I assumed that could also be the case as well. On the other hand, if you were to play me an unfamiliar song from about 1965 to about 1980, I can, with pretty good accuracy, narrow down its release to within a year or two just by its sound. It's a game I like to play with the SiriusXM radio channel. There's no doubt that pop music has become a lot more homogenized in the past couple decades, and the technological advances that drastically alter the sound of music are becoming fewer and fewer. Has there really been anything other than (the scourge of) Autotune that's really affected the sound of music in the past 20 years? The only other thing I can think of is digital sampling, which hit like a tidal wave around 1983-4. However, I must vehemently disagree that you wouldn't immediately recognize something from the 80s. The sounds and styles of music in the 80s were much more distinct. Even my kids, who were born in the 90s, can immediately recognize song from the 80s by their sound.