What tones you on?..Yes this is about music - When do you think was the most influential point in music history?

I want to start a debate now for my second topic, it came to me the other day, after seeing the Brit awards, when was the most influential time in music history, to inspire today's artists and music trends?
I thought to myself looking back at popular artists of the time, from the 1960's you have the likes of The Rolling stones, The Beatles, James Brown. The 70's we had Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, KISS, The Bee Gees. The 80's brought us Michael Jackson, Queen, Madonna just to name a few. The 90's saw the increase in specific genres becoming more popular, hip hop started to flourish and develop it's own set of wings with popular artists at the forefront, MC Hammer, 2Pac and public enemy carrying the flag, opening the way to a new breed of music.
This wasn't the only genre to take on a new look, rock swiftly came along with alternative rock, some of the artists still take high position in many people's CD collection, familiar artists such as Red Hot Chilli Peppers, R.E.M and Nirvana. Nirvana also bringing grunge to the listeners ear, unfortunately saw a decline after Britpop was released in retaliation against this.
We then had the infamous 00's, which saw the technological revolution vastly increase. Artists that set the tone at this time were, The White Stripes, Outkast, Coldplay and Eminem. This became the time when there were varying extremes of music within the charts, which showed that audience tastes are much more spread out on the musical genre spectrum.

With the variety of different artists iv listed here it's difficult for me to say specifically when the most influential time in music history was, I think I would have to say the 80's, but that is just my personal preference, I'm sure there are a multitude of factors as to why I say that, possibly because I was brought up having to listen to the likes of Madonna and Michael Jackson..not sure that's the right combination, I mean come on one was extremely promiscuous and the other had a major inferiority complex. (Hell I could have turned into a Neurotic sex addict..coul have I said.)
The 80's did allow a greater adaptation of music to follow, I think this was the essential foundation for the music we have now. Though some may say the music we have now currently in the top 40 is just a combination of the same rhythmic syntheised rubbish, but that just depends on the music you like. Personally I would have to say that the music industry then may have been slightly more difficult to enter into, what with the limited media output on offer, as opposed to now in that the Internet is a much more efficient tool to be used to get new upcoming artist's recognition. Maybe that's why there aren't as many significant artists these days, don't get me wrong there are a lot of talented artist's but in terms of quality to quantity ratio we have probably lost the ability to spot TRUE talent. Social media bases such as Myspace, Facebook and twitter, allowing a greater advertising and link to the music industry allows greater saturation, but of what? You only have to look at X-Factor to see how effortless it is. It's as if we have put a fast forward button on the longevity of these artists which some barely last a year then we never hear from again, sort of takes the term '15 minutes of fame' a bit too literal.

The question I'm putting forward here is when was the most influential time in music history? why do you think this? and what do you think we will see in the next ten years? Please leave your comments, much appreciated.
Have a good Monday morning I'm off to get some sleep before the night shift.. great. Don't forget to add me on Facebook.