> One, I hated the term "raving"
Completely agreed on the terminology. When I got into the scene (late 90s, Philly and Baltimore), everyone legit totally avoided saying "rave" or "raving" when talking with other folks in the scene. We all just said "party", and it was clear what you were talking about based on context (and, for better or worse, clothing style). No one said "ravers" either, it was always "party kids" instead, at least among the younger end of the crowd.
"Party" could interchangeably refer to either a "one-off" event or a club weekly/monthly, and similarly made no connotations as to whether or not the venue was licensed/above-board. Unlicensed one-offs were referred to as "outlaw", "warehouse party", etc. There were also unlicensed venues which threw regular weekly/monthly parties and these were absolutely amazing, so I'm a bit perplexed by the folks here saying a "real" rave is only an unlicensed one-off.
In any case, in my area, as a term "rave" was largely only used by news media, law enforcement, and outsiders who completely misunderstood what the scene was about. The only major exception was internet discussions – web sites like ravelinks.com, newsgroups like alt.rave. But even there, "rave" in the name just helped people find the sites, and still wasn't a term thrown around much in actual discussions.
> Has the music droppped off?
No, it's better than ever in my opinion, especially for non-mainstream house-adjacent music. There are a ton of talented producers who are seamlessly merging many genres and influences... folks are combining classic UK rave synths (well, really from Belgian New Beat originally) with Italo-disco, or taking trance and adding in happy hardcore elements, etc. Many classic samples and sounds, but given a new twist, it's great.
That said, I used to be a major drum and bass head back in the day, but largely lost interest in that genre as it became less danceable over the years. Not to mention my knees aren't what they used to be...