Radio This Week Back Then #32: August 25-31 (2024)

What was on the radio this week…back then. This is a weekly visit back to radio audio from this week in past years for those that enjoy radio history, those working in radio looking for promotional ideas, or stations looking to re-find lost audio of their heritage. If you enjoy these weekly audio rewinds, they take a lot of time to put together, so please do me a favor, subscribe, and share and pass it on. Thank you!

Back in the 1990s when I built and ran the old 100000watts.com online directory of radio and TV stations, holidays used to be an extra busy time tracking radio format changes. There are much fewer format changes now than there were back then. So, this week, I pulled some of the format changes that occurred this week back in the past, the week preceding the Labor Day holiday weekend.

• Los Angeles | KNX-FM 93.1 format change from mellow rock to top 40 “Hit Radio 93”

• D/FW | KKZN 93.3 format change to modern AC “Merge”

• D/FW | KTXQ 102.1 format change to rhythmic oldies “Jammin’ Oldies”

• Tampa Bay | WAKS-FM 100.7 rebrand from “100.7 Kiss FM” to “Mix 100.7”

• Oklahoma City | KZBS 98.9 first day as hot AC “98.9 Kiss FM”

How did these changes do? Well, then-Arbitron used to publicly release its quarterly ratings books for overall 12+ ratings to local newspapers and the trades (the more important demo breakouts required paying to be a subscriber). So, even though 12+ book is the “beauty pageant” numbers, it’s still interesting to see the trends, So, digging through old Billboards and Radio & Records, here’s how the above were doing in the ratings book before the format change, the ratings from the summer book when the format change occurred, and the four quarterly books after.

KNX-FM’s flip to KKHR saw good growth, but ultimately only lasted 3 years before flipping back to KNX-FM in 1986. KTXQ’s change mirrored the rhythmic format’s national trend — initial large spike, but falling off as the small library of oldies burnt out. In fact, it continued to decline in the periods after the ones shown in the chart (down to a 2.0 in the Spring 2000 period). Only WMTX and KYIS still survive today.

Related: Los Angeles

For the decade leading up to this format change, KNX-FM ran its famous “mellow rock” format. The rock AC format that became en vogue in the early 1990s certainly took some of its DNA from KNX-FM. That came to an end on 3PM on 25 August 1983 when KNX-FM flipped to top 40 “Hit Radio 93.” It would take the KKHR calls shortly after the flip.

The aircheck covers the last 20 minutes of the mellow rock format that includes a retrospective with a lot of its old, unique, quirky, sometimes funky, 1970s-era jingles. They don’t make jingles like these today — or anytime in the last 40 years… After the tribute comes the flip to top 40 with the first song being “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” from Michael Jackson.

Related: Dallas/Fort Worth, WBAP

The FCC created the C2 FM class in the late 1980s. Before then, outside the crowded Northeast and parts of California where class Bs exist, radio stations elsewhere were either a class C, class C1, or a class A. Class A FMs were limited to a transmitter height of 328’ and 3 kw (later bumped to 6 kw) of power (or equivalent) while a C or C1 could go up 100 kw, with a C1 capped out at a height of 981’. The new C2 class capped at for 492’ 50 kw or equivalent, allowing for the first time a medium power facility between an A and a C1/C.

It was not long before someone figured out a new 93.3C2 could be created in the D/FW market, and so the FCC allocated 93.3C2 to Fort Worth suburb Haltom City. A chance at a new frequency in one of the largest markets in the US meant it took years for the competing applications to get settled down to one.

On 25 October 1996, Susquehanna signed on the new 93.3 as AAA “93-3 the Zone,” temporarily under the KNBR-FM calls, which they had used as a placeholder as the company owned KNBR 680 San Francisco and had the rights to them. Curiously, during its relatively brief lifetime, the station has been home to several call letters of legendary AMs it has been co-owned with — KNBR-FM, KLIF-FM, and now WBAP-FM. Though, the 93.3 spot has not been legendary in its own right…

Although the transmitter is centrally located, the D/FW Metroplex is, from west to east, the length of the state of Connecticut. So, a class C2 is disadvantaged from the class C operations running from the tower farm in Cedar Hill, southwest of Dallas. Compounding 93.3’s problems is that the city grade and primary contours largely cover areas where African Americans or Hispanics make up the majority of the population reached — and the bulk of formats over the years have been largely aimed not at those communities. Two AAA attempts and the current conservative talk programming, for example, are demographic draws inversely proportional to the populations the signal covers.

This week in 1999 brought us the very first format change — with many more to come — for 93.3. “93-3 the Zone” signed off and the station began stunting with a loop of a remixed version of M’s “Pop Muzik” that was interspersed with people saying “merge.” On 31 August 1999, the stunting ended, and the new modern AC format signed on as a “fusion” where “radio and the Internet merge.” The new branding was a bit of a mouthful: “Merge Radio, merge933.net.” It also used the slogan “Cool Rock, Smart Pop," which was trademarked by Susquehanna, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram at that time. Calls would change to KKMR and the station really embraced the “merge” theme — new artists were touted as “e-merge-ing artists,” for example.

Living in D/FW, I found KKMR to be fairly decent at the time, and it certainly did not sound like a clone of other stations elsewhere (i.e. KTXQ’s “jammin’ oldies” flip further below). The limited signal and a modern rock competitor in KDGE 94.5 “94.5 the Edge” was tough going, especially when KDGE got a full market signal upgrade in the following year. They were early with the radio and Internet “merging” theme…and it would have been in hard in 1999 to foresee what that really looked like 25 years later today in 2024.

Ultimately, “Merge” only lasted two and a half years. It flipped to classic rock KDBN in 2002, which initially had some decent success against classic rock rival KZPS 92.5. See the profile chart below for all the format changes the signal has gone through.

Since the beginning of the year, 93.3 has been a FM simulcast of co-owned news/talk WBAP 820. Thanks, as always, to Chris Huff for the old logos and validating the history of the Texas outlets.

Related: KTXQ, Dallas/Fort Worth

After 20 years, the AOR “Q102, Texas Best Rock” brand ended this week in 1998. Q102 signed off 28 August 1998 and then went to stunting consisting of simulcasting co-owned (at the time) fellow Chancellor Media (now iHeart) stations. On the 28th, KTXQ simulcasted rhythmic CHR KYLD 94.9 “Wild 94-9” San Francisco, then went to CHR WHTZ 100.3 “Z100” New York on the 29th, modern AC KYSR 98.7 “Star 98.7, Today’s Best Music” Los Angeles on the 30th, and ending with country WUBE-FM 105.1 “B105, Good Times, Great Country” Cincinnati on the 31st.

This aircheck starts at 2:53PM — note that WUBE-FM is in the Eastern time zone, so the time they give out is an hour ahead of Dallas — on the 31st to pick up on the final minutes of simulcasting WUBE-FM and then the 3PM “birth” and flip to rhythmic oldies. In an odd coincidence, before the simulcast ends, WUBE-FM does traffic and weather and the Cincinnati weather is given by then-WCPO 9 chief meteorologist Pete Delkus. Delkus moved to D/FW in 2005 to replace long-time WFAA 8 forecaster Troy Dugan to become WFAA’s new chief meteorologist, which he still remains today.

Rhythmic oldies was all the rage circa 1998-2000, so this was D/FW’s chance to jump on the bandwagon. The format started spreading a few months before — KCMG 100.3 “Mega 100” Los Angeles, KNAX 97.9 “Mega 97.9” Fresno, KMMG 95.5 “Mega 95.5” Albuquerque. The format debuted in Tampa the week before this aircheck on WFJO 101.5. It would spread to many markets, with New York’s WBIX 105.1 picking it up by year-end to get into the nation’s top market. The old M Street Journal counted more than 100 rhythmic oldies stations by May 1999.

Generally, but not always, the format tended to be more targeted toward Hispanic audiences in markets in the West and Southwest with “Mega” being a commonly used brand. The more African-American-targeted outlets on the East Coast and the South tended to use “Jammin’ Oldies.” The format grew fast — and began to fade fairly quickly as well…all those songs were fun to hear together initially, but with a narrow playlist, the repetition quickly created burn out.

For D/FW, the station used the “Jammin’ Oldies” brand and eventually picked up “Magic 102” for its name. In the launch, it started a name-the-station contest where listeners could fax or mail (but not email or text back then) their submission. The “Magic” name was previously used next door on the dial for almost 14 years on AC KMGC 102.9 up until May 1991 when it became KDMX “Mix 102.9.”

Unlike today where it is not uncommon for new stations to launch with 5,000 or 10,000 songs in a row, the new KTXQ was loaded with commercials — a couple of 5 minute ad breaks in the first hour greeted listeners along with the new playlist.

In a facility swap in 2000, the KTXQ calls and “Magic” brand moved to the rimshot 94.5 facility that was the home to modern rock KDGE “94.5 the Edge,” which, in turn, moved to the full market 102.1 facility.

Related: Tampa Bay
One of the earliest FMs in Tampa Bay and Florida, the present day WMTX traces it beginnings to 17 November 1947, when it began broadcasting as WDAE-FM 105.7, the new simulcast and sister to CBS radio network affiliate WDAE 1250. The move from 105.7 to 100.7 and a bigger signal occurred on 2 April 1951.

For 42 years now, the station has been some variant of AC under a variety of call letters and brands.

This aircheck covers the rebranding from “100.7 Kiss FM” to “Mix 100.7” back in this week in 1999. The aircheck begins with the last hour of its time as “Kiss FM” during its weekly “Friday Night At The ‘80s” show. They jumped the gun on the actual flip — playing a “Mix 100.7” promo between the Phil Collins and The Romantics track at the beginning of the aircheck before cutting it off.

The actual flip is pretty anticlimactic…between “Maggie May” (the last song on “Kiss”) and “Call Me” is a new “Mix” liner and that’s it. No real announcement…just all of a sudden new branding and imaging. The calls remained WAKS-FM for a few weeks; the switch to the present day WMTX calls occurred on 17 September 1999. The WMTX calls and “Mix” brand were used in the market on sister 95.7 from 1990-1997.

Related: KZBS, Oklahoma City

The early history of the 98.9 frequency is hard to tell…there is not much documented and what little is documented is conflicting.

The current licensed facility traces its roots back to 1969. Some places show it started much earlier, but that conflates the current license with that of the previous licensed outlet, classical/”good music” KYFM. KYFM had its license canceled by the FCC in 1968 after the FCC declined to renew it. The FCC then opened up the allocation and ended up awarding a license to the owners of KBYE 890, then targeting African Americans with religious programming in the morning and soul and R&B music in the afternoon and evening. KBYE-FM signed on in 1969 and then changed calls in 1971 to KFJL. KBYE-FM/KFJL was notable as the market’s first FM outlet targeting African Americans. According to a 28 September 1972 article in The Daily Oklahoman newspaper, KJFL was sold to legendary R&B singer James Brown. Brown had ownership in a few R&B/soul radio stations in the 1970s, including WJBE 1430 Knoxville, WRDW 1480 Augusta, and WEBB 1360 Baltimore.

In 1978, after being sold, KFJL dropped the R&B programming and became KTLS-FM. Some places describe KTLS-FM as a religious outlet. However, a 5 September 1980 article in the main local daily newspaper, The Daily Oklahoman, profiled the station as running on a “shoe-string budget” and having “only two disc jockeys,” “no advertising sales staff,” broadcasting weekdays only from 7:30AM-2:30PM, and with “all the records played either belong to the two DJs or have been donated by listeners.” The article notes that when KFJL flipped to KTLS-FM, it “originally had an ‘adult mellow rock’ format.” The paper noted the current format, at time of publication, was “all-oldie format — ‘50s and ‘60s mainstream rock ‘n’ roll, a smattering of 1970s hits and no country-western music.” The paper also noted that it “had the all-oldies format since April.” Whatever it was, it ended a few weeks later when it became KLNK “the Link.”

KLNK also brings more conflicting history. Some places list it as an AC, but a profile of in Radio & Records’s 6 March 1981 edition, calls it out as a CHR and profiles the CHR battle between KLNK and KOFM 104.1. It does appear it shifted to AC by the time it rebranded with the KZBS calls in 1983. History is pretty straight forward after that…

KZBS ran an AC format for much of the 1980s. It evolved to hot AC “99FM” and during the spring of 1988, it rebranded as “Z99” and moved to top 40 and ran with that up until this aircheck.

Top 40 outlets converting to hot ACs were a common theme in the early 1990s. Up Interstate 44, Tulsa’s KAYI 106.9 followed that path. In Oklahoma City, it was KZBS giving up top 40 and becoming hot AC “98.9 Kiss FM.”

This aircheck is from AM drive on the first day of the new format and brand. The calls are still KZBS as the present KYIS calls did not become effective until the following week.

As always, the logos and other intellectual property belong to the stations. The recordings were made from over the air broadcasts.

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