Radio AM to FM: January 21, 2005
Movin' On Up ... And Down
Clear Channel announced a major change in its Los Angeles- area AM stations last
week. Effective February 3rd, the sports format will move down the dial from
690 and 1150 to 570, creating X-TRA Sports 570.
690 will take on the standards format as the Fabulous 690, giving it coverage
in both Los Angeles and San Diego due to a power 75,000 watt transmitter located
in Mexico. Of course the name "Fabulous 690" doesn't sound as good
as "570," ("Super 690?" "Mighty 690?"). I'm hoping
that perhaps the actual audio quality will improve, as 690 is only run -- not
owned -- by Clear Channel and therefore is not necessarily subject to Clear Channel's
awful narrowband engineering directive.
Left in the air is the future of 1150. Good money has the syndicated angry liberal
talk format Air America taking root; Spanish is another possibility but unlikely
in an area that already has numerous Spanish stations -- many on FM.
KLOS Smashes Goal
More than 9000 CDs and DVDs were collected by KLOS in its Operation: Reel,
Rock
and Roll charity event, shattering the goal of 2000 when it launched in November.
Additionally, more than $20,000 in merchandise was donated by Panasonic including
a 53" HD television and a huge quantity of CD and DVD players.
The drive benefited injured and active duty troops at Camp Pendleton, Bethesda
National Naval Hospital and field hospitals and military units in Iraq.
Fall Arbitrons
Power 106 was the big winner in the Fall Arbitrons released last week. Holding
steady at 4.9, the urban hits station beat everyone else including 2nd place
KFI (4.4), KLVE (4.3), KIIS-FM (4.3) and KROQ (4.1).
A month of highly-rated Christmas music came through once again over at KOST,
which saw a huge jump to 3.9 compared with Summer's 3.1. This is KOST's highest
rating in over a year, in fact. Sister station KBIG declined a little, earning
1.9 compared with Summer's 2.3. Star 98.7 held steady at 1.8.
KFI's second place finish won the talk wars once again, beating out format competitors
KLSX, KABC and KRLA by 1.4 or more.
The full story: Each rating is an estimate of the percentage of listeners aged
12 and over tuned to a station between the hours of 6 AM and 12 midnight. (Station
- Summer rating - Fall rating)
Power 106 - 4.9 - 4.9; KFI - 4.3 - 4.4; KLVE - 3.7 - 4.3; KIIS-FM - 4.1 - 4.2;
KROQ 4.3 - 4.1; KOST - 3.1 - 3.9; KTWV - 3.0 - 3.9; KLAX - 4.4 - 3.5; KBUE/KBUA
- 3.3 - 3.4; KSCA - 2.5 - 3.1
The Beat - 3.6 - 3.0; KLSX - 2.8 - 3.0; KRCD/KRCV - 2.4 - 2.8; KRTH - 2.9 - 2.8;
Hot 92.3 - 3.1 - 2.4; KSSE - 2.4 - 2.4; KLOS - 2.1 - 2.1; KBIG - 2.3 - 1.9; Arrow
93 - 1.6 - 1.8
Star 98.7 - 1.8 - 1.8; KZLA - 2.1 - 1.8; KJLH - 2.1 - 1.6; K-Mozart - 1.5 - 1.6;
KNX - 1.8 - 1.6; KFWB - 1.5 - 1.5; KXOL - 1.4 - 1.5; KLYY - 1.3 - 1.4; KDAY -
1.2 - 1.0; The Fish - 0.9 - 0.9
KLAC - 0.8 - 0.9; KRLA - 1.0 - 0.8; KDKD/KDLE - 0.6 - 0.7; KHJ - 0.8 - 0.7; KLTX
- 0.8 - 0.7; KWVE - 0.4 - 0.7; KKLA - 0.5 - 0.6; KSPN - 0.5 - 0.6; XTRA Sports
690/1150 - 0.7 - 0.6; KTNQ - 0.5 - 0.5
KGGI - 0.4 - 0.4; KWIZ - 0.6 - 0.4; KWKW - 0.5 - 0.3
Ratings are © 2004-2005, Arbitron, Inc. May not be quoted
or reproduced without
prior written permission from Arbitron.
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Copyright © 2005 Richard Wagoner and The Copley Press.
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