Radio This Week Back Then: Week Ending March 23
Audio this week from CHR KKHR Los Angeles, alt country KIKK-FM Houston, and a CHR face-off in Little Rock between KZOU-FM and KKYK-FM
What was on the radio this week…back then. If you enjoy these weekly audio rewinds, please do me a favor, subscribe, and share and pass it on. Thank you!
This week is another shorter edition as I have been traveling the last week and a half knocking off Egypt from my travel bucket list. This week includes top 40 KKHR 93.1 Los Angeles, our first alt country visit via KIKK-FM 95.7 Houston, and our first visit to the Little Rock market with a top 40 face-off between KZOU-FM 98.5 and KKYK-FM 103.7.
Aircheck: KKHR 93.1 Los Angeles, March 20 1986
This aircheck is from near the end of KKHR’s run as a top 40 outlet, as two months later, it would revert back to the previous KNX-FM calls and “mellow rock” format it originally displaced in 1983. The great Jack Armstrong is the DJ on this aircheck.
Madonna/“Angel”
John Cougar Mellencamp/“R.O.C.K. In The U.S.A.”
INXS/“What You Need”
Lionel Richie/“Say You, Say Me”
ZZ Top/“Legs”
Janet Jackson/“What Have You Done For Me Lately”
Julian Lennon/“Stick Around”
Heart/“These Dreams”
Legal ID: KKHR 93.1 Los Angeles
Hit Radio Record Report
5) Mr. Mister/“Kyrie”
4) The Bangles/“Manic Monday”
3) Atlantic Starr/“Secret Lovers”
2) Falco/“Rock Me Amadeus”
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Aircheck: KIKK-FM 95.7 “95-7 Kick FM, Houston's Country Alternative” Houston, March 19 2001
After being country format rivals for more than a decade, KIKK-FM and KILT-FM 100.3 came under common ownership in 1993. With KKBQ-FM 92.9 having become the 3rd major country station in the market in 1991, to differentiate KIKK-FM from sister KILT-FM and rival KKBQ-FM, KIKK-FM tried various variants of the format and several branding changes — from “Kick 96 KIKK” to “Kick Country 95.7FM” to “Young Country 95-7” to a Texas country/Americana/alt country/rock/AAA-ish hybrid as “95-7 Kick FM, Houston’s Country Alternative” before moving out of the format to smooth jazz KHJZ-FM in November 2002.
This aircheck, with DJ Harley Colt, is from the alt country era. It was anything but a ratings smash; I may have been the only person who dug this. Likely a radio train wreck to most folks, but in my book, there is nothing wrong with mixing up Jack Ingram, Lyle Lovett, Texas and Red Dirt country, and tossing in some rock.
Dave Matthews Band/“So Much To Say”
Trent Summar & The New Row Mob/“It Never Rains In Southern California”
Jack Ingram/“Work This Out” (live cut)
Sons Of The Desert/“What I Did Right”
Sheryl Crow/“Everyday Is A Winding Road”
Steve Miller Band/“The Joker”
Sara Evans/“I Could Not Ask For More”
Lyle Lovett/“That’s Right (You’re Not From Texas)”
PC Cowboys/“Butt Crack Boogie”
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Face-Off: KZOU-FM 98.5 “All Hit Zoo 98” Vs KKYK-FM 103.7 “FM104 KKYK” Little Rock, March 17 1990
Same date: Saturday, March 17 1990. Same format: CHR. Same market: Little Rock. Two stations: KZOU-FM vs KKYK-FM.
I am not sure I could prove it, but I think the radio receiver selectivity back in the day on portable, hand-held cassette recorders, like the old Sony Walkmans, were far superior to the portable digital devices of today. Case in point: I taped these on a visit to southwest Arkansas, about 80 miles from the transmitters (about 15-20 miles outside the service contour in their maps below). There is certainly some static, but I don’t think any hand-held portable recorder I own would even have picked up the signals at that distance today.
These two stations battled throughout the 1980s (98.5 as KLAZ-FM and then KZOU-FM), and these airchecks are from near the end of their format battle. For this period, in the Spring 1990 Arbitron ratings, KKYK-FM was ahead of KZOU-FM. Like many CHRs of the time, KZOU-FM would shift to hot AC KURB “B98.5” the following year. KKYK-FM would head in a different direction and flip to rock “Kick 103.7, Rockin’ The Rock” in 1992.
KZOU-FM 98.5 Little Rock “All Hit Zoo 98”
Randy Cain is the DJ for this St Patrick’s Day aircheck.
Paula Abdul/“Knocked Out”
Cinderella/“Don’t Know What You Got (Till Its Gone)”
A’Me Lorain/“Whole Wide World”
Tom Petty/Free Fallin’”
Janet Jackson/“Escapade”
Kiss/“Forever”
Adam Ant/“Room At The Top”
Roxette/“Dangerous”
Phil Collins/“I Wish It Would Rain Down”
Legal ID: KZOU-FM 98.5 Little Rock
Jane Child/“Don’t Wanna Fall In Love”
Bonus legal ID from later the same day…
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KKYK-FM 103.7 Little Rock “FM104 KKYK”
Calloway/“I Wanna Be Rich”
Kiss/“Forever”
John Parr/“St Elmo’s Fire (Man In Motion)”
Tommy Page/“I’ll Be Your Everything”
The B-52s/“Love Shack”
Michael Bolton/“How Can We Be Lovers”
Sheena Easton/“The Lover In Me”
Seduction/“Heartbeat”
Adam Ant/“Room At The Top”
Legal ID: KKYK-FM 103.7 Little Rock
Billy Joel/“I Go To Extremes”
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As always, the logos and other intellectual property belong to the stations. The recordings were made from over the air broadcasts.