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104.3 KBIG censoring songs

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derek20la

Over the last couple weeks while listening to "MYfm", I've noticed that they have been playing ultra censored versions of songs, going beyond the usual radio edits.

For example, Expresso by Sabrina Carpenter. The radio version lyrics say "my give a damns are on vacation", but "give a damn" is cut out.

Another is That's What I Like by Bruno Mars. The lyrics say "sex by the fire at night", but now they censor the word sex.

Another is TiK ToK by Kesha. The cut out the mention of P. Diddy, and for "brush my teeth with a bottle of Jack", they cut out Jack.

I know in the past I've heard these songs on 104.3 without the edits, and other LA stations play the standard radio edits as well. Is there any particular reason they are now being extra cautious? I can't imagine anyone living in LA reporting them to the FCC for playing a song with the word "damn".
 
But that's been going on forever...Like with Katy Perry's California girls with snoop dog but the hot ac stations played the version with Katie Perry only and the song by E-40 u and dat they censor out the word monkey. And don't forget a few years ago when they tried to get rid of the song isn't it cold outside during Christmas radio.

And it goes on and on and it's not new. While I wish they wouldn't do it it is what it is.
 
I think we're looking at this wrong, from a programming / free-speech standpoint.

Other way 'round, let's look at this from an audience standpoing. MyFM is the station for women with children. They want radio programming that is absolutely 110% uncontroversal. Literal background noise to survive the day and the kids screaming without having to have an awkward conversation about something they heard in a song.

The listeners want it. The advertisers love it. And it helps iHM print money.
 
derek20la said:
I know in the past I've heard these songs on 104.3 without the edits,
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That makes me think the edited version is coming from a different place. Perhaps the edited version was during a syndicated show or perhaps an out of town VT. This is iHeart. The music you hear isn't always coming from the local hard drive. Another tip is look at the RDS. If you don't see the right information, the music is coming from a different source. Also, each one of those songs have multiple remixes from the label.
 
TheBigA said:
This is iHeart. The music you hear isn't always coming from the local hard drive.
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It's coming from their corporately maintained music system. There are different mixes for many songs and stations can choose which one to use. Some are "cleaned" more than legally required, as described by the OP. Since all the music goes into a centralized system, if some PD wants to do his own edit for whatever reason, it goes into that system and becomes available to anyone else at iHeart that wants to use it.
 
FYI — iHeart Atlanta (so, I'd assume LA as well) is completely cloud-based now. There is no *studio* anymore. Everything is just a production studio that can be any iHR station at any time from anywhere. A cloud-blased playlist feeds the transmitter.
 
Theater of My Mind said:
It's coming from their corporately maintained music system. There are different mixes for many songs and stations can choose which one to use. Some are "cleaned" more than legally required, as described by the OP. Since all the music goes into a centralized system, if some PD wants to do his own edit for whatever reason, it goes into that system and becomes available to anyone else at iHeart that wants to use it;
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Someone told me it was like that at iHeart, all ridiculously centralized. They aren't radio station, just brands with various local FM dial positions And all the different versions of some songs, including the immaculate versions of songs for areas of the country that are still squirrely about language like "damn" in 2025 than say, Seattle, where a song as unlinkably vile as the original version of "So What" Anti-Nowhere League (YouTube it at your own risk.) would be merely Tuesday night on KRAB 107.7....In the 1980s.

K.M. Richards said:
It may be that the labels are creating "ultra safe" language edit versions and iHeart is playing it safe.

In this Bizarro-world administration, almost anything becomes a reason to go after a station's license.
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@K.M. Richards might have a point about labels and iHeart. Although this isn't exactly helping KBIG (I'm sure KBIG's audience is wondering WTF with the nanny edits too.)

henry said:
I think we're looking at this wrong, from a programming / free-speech standpoint.

Other way 'round, let's look at this from an audience standpoing. MyFM is the station for women with children. They want radio programming that is absolutely 110% uncontroversal. Literal background noise to survive the day and the kids screaming without having to have an awkward conversation about something they heard in a song.

The listeners want it. The advertisers love it. And it helps iHM print money.
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I suppose the labels and radio could ask the artists sweetly to make nice, non-offensive music because radio can't be too careful in this current.....Whatever.

The problem is this the kind of request that gave us "gangsta rap" instead. Most artists passionately hate anyone telling them what to do. And they hold nothing back when they are.

This is yet another infection on radio by The Powers That Be. If radio becomes super sanitized to the point where even having a serious, frank, mature 6am Sunday morning public service conversation about breast, cervical or ovarian cancer on the radio is somehow an obscenity problem, then we're all in trouble.
 
TheBigA said:
But the OP says he's heard unedited versions at the same station.
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Is KOST/KIIS running the nanny edits too? If so, it's probably a new nationwide iHeart thing to cover their butts with Carr's FCC in charge. I mean, this is L.A., not Branson. Why would they be doing that just in Los Angeles?
 
TheBigA said:
But the OP says he's heard unedited versions at the same station.
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And that is because the centralized "music server" has all the possible versions. When each station creates its own "library" they specify which version they want to play.
 
Bongwater said:
Someone told me it was like that at iHeart, all ridiculously centralized. They aren't radio station, just brands with various local FM dial positions
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The idea that centralizing music collections is somehow bad seems extreme. iHeart just keeps every possible song that any of their stations might pay on a server. It's accessible, as if it were right down the hall. It is redundant. It has generator and UPS backup. And it has every possible version of a song a station could want.

So if I'm PD at an iHeart station, and want to do an "all acoustic" weekend show, I can instantly find all the acoustic versions I need on the server. Otherwise, the amount of work in tracking them down would make such a show a waste of time.
 
henry said:
Let's look at this from an audience standpoing. MyFM is the station for women with children. They want radio programming that is absolutely 110% uncontroversal. Literal background noise to survive the day and the kids screaming without having to have an awkward conversation about something they heard in a song.
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I agree. KBIG is a Hot AC station, not wanting to rock the boat too much in how family-friendly it is. Perhaps KIIS-FM, a Top 40 station aiming a bit younger, isn't as concerned with some spicy lyrics. And I assume Urban KRRL, also owned by iHeart, goes a big more adult with lyrics, up to what it thinks the FCC will allow.

Of course, as David and others note, the drop in ratings for Urban and Rhythmic stations in recent years is partly because they must edit so many of the lyrics on popular hip hop songs. That may be further driving young listeners to non-broadcast sources for their music.
 
Gregg. said:
Of course, as David and others note, the drop in ratings for Urban and Rhythmic stations in recent years is partly because they must edit so many of the lyrics on popular hip hop songs.
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... Or not play them at all!
 
TheBigA said:
But the OP says he's heard unedited versions at the same station.
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To clarify, the last time I heard the unedited versions would be many months to a year ago. Can't remember for sure. But once the change was made, they stuck to it.

henry said:
let's look at this from an audience standpoint. MyFM is the station for women with children. They want radio programming that is absolutely 110% uncontroversial.
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This is probably the correct answer. I didn't stop to consider that I -- a 40 something year old man -- am not the target audience of MyFM. From that perspective, their choice of edits make a lot more sense. I've heard the phrase "wall of women" used before to describe the LA iHeart stations.
 
hotpatrick2004 said:
And don't forget a few years ago when they tried to get rid of the song isn't it cold outside during Christmas radio.
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Who are "they?" A couple of bloggers? I don't recall anyone with actual authority trying to "get rid of" the song. Some stations just chose not to keep playing a song from 1949 because of their perception of what their audience wanted or was appropriate for them? Regardless of my thoughts on the song, it's a non issue.
 


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