Totally agree with you on this! Back in the 60's I was seeing my musical hero's in relatively small venues. Then into the 70 and forward the stadiums starting getting bigger. In fact, so big that if you were unwilling to fork over 2wks of paychecks, you might as well bring benoculars to see the band. I have that up for years, and opted for just watching on MTV.
Finally, it's happening that you can catch some of these great musician in small intmate venues, in some case even able to stop and tell them yourself how much you enjoyed the show. This is the way it should be.