It's a small signal, but we'll take it! Finally a real hit music station for Huntsville. Good thing I've got HD radio so I can pick up the 100.3 HD2 signal. Starting out with 10,065 commercial free songs in a row. Thank you clear channel for the christmas gift lol! Can't wait to see what this new station will sound like once it gets going. The website is 1065kissfm.com
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106.5 Kiss FM. Huntsville's Hit Music Now
- Thread starter RollTide
- Start date
I've been listening to it online for a few minutes now. I hate that I missed the sign-on last night. Does anyone have it recorded, and could post it online here?
Of course, this is a great thing for Huntsville. It appears that Huntsville has its first mainstream CHR to compete with WZYP since, what, the early 90s? Here are some observations:
1. Since they are running commercial-free, is the mix of music we are hearing now, typical of what they will be playing once commercials are added? If so, I'm liking what I'm hearing. They seem to be a tad recurrent-heavy, but considering what we've had up until now, I'm not complaining!
2. Even with the recurrents, they're playing songs that ZYP never dreamed of touching ("Love Lockdown" by Kanye West being one example).
3. The signal (or lack of it) concerns me. I know they can't do much about this (short of swapping frequencies with an existing station, which I don't see happening), but the fact is the station is not receivable outside of most of Madison County.
4. In the 45 minutes I've been listening so far, I tuned to ZYP's stream 3 times, and each time they were playing commercials (ha!). Either ZYP doesn't see them as a factor, or status quo is just fine with them (or likely, both). I just don't see ZYP tweaking any to adjust to the new competition.
I'll post additional thoughts & observations as the days progress, and as commercials will be eventually added how things change by then. Until then, happy listening, Huntsville!
Of course, this is a great thing for Huntsville. It appears that Huntsville has its first mainstream CHR to compete with WZYP since, what, the early 90s? Here are some observations:
1. Since they are running commercial-free, is the mix of music we are hearing now, typical of what they will be playing once commercials are added? If so, I'm liking what I'm hearing. They seem to be a tad recurrent-heavy, but considering what we've had up until now, I'm not complaining!
2. Even with the recurrents, they're playing songs that ZYP never dreamed of touching ("Love Lockdown" by Kanye West being one example).
3. The signal (or lack of it) concerns me. I know they can't do much about this (short of swapping frequencies with an existing station, which I don't see happening), but the fact is the station is not receivable outside of most of Madison County.
4. In the 45 minutes I've been listening so far, I tuned to ZYP's stream 3 times, and each time they were playing commercials (ha!). Either ZYP doesn't see them as a factor, or status quo is just fine with them (or likely, both). I just don't see ZYP tweaking any to adjust to the new competition.
I'll post additional thoughts & observations as the days progress, and as commercials will be eventually added how things change by then. Until then, happy listening, Huntsville!
Yea the signal is an issue but like I said, I'll take it over nothing any day LOL. The only way I see a signal swap with one of their bigger signals is if Kiss really makes a big splash & is profitable enough that they think they will make more money than one of their current other signals formats. I'm sure you're right about ZYP. They will likely not respond to this station. As far as the music, it's been spot on from what I've heard so far. I doubt commercials will change much. They'll probably drop a couple recurrents, but that's it. I think we'll likely see Elvis Duran & Ryan Seacrest. You didn't miss much with the sign on. They played the last Christmas song, Kiss FM legal ID, then right into Kesha Die Young. No special sign on. Sorry I didn't get to record it. I couldn't get it to work. An interesting observation for me is the all female image voice. I prefer a male/female mix with CHR imaging myself. I wonder if that too is permanent. Anyway, more to come!
Since it is a low power transmitter that being fed, for lack of a better term, by an HD-2, they will probably run Premium Choice. For as much as we might rip it, this is actually a great use for it. It doesn't cost CCM&E much and they will most likely make much more with CHR than whatever revenue that signal was bringing in before. If it does well enough revenuewise, they could consider having a local airshift down the line.
It's been years since I've gotten my butt up to Huntsvegas, so I'm out of the loop on ZYP. What exactly are they doing that you guys don't like? Are they stale, or have they drifted to Hot AC from CHR or something? I remember them always being kinda conservative with their playlists even back in the olden days.
Zach said:
Zach, if you are familiar with Y-102 in Montgomery, they are virtually the same as ZYP. Presentation seems the same, voiceovers seem the same, both stations do the retro lunch as well. I figure you have probably been within listening range of Y-102 sometime or another recently so that's the best analogy for ZYP.
-Travis
I haven't gotten to listen to Y-102 in some time but I have heard they are very similar to ZYP. I'll classify them like atlantaboy put it on the CHR board after streaming it online. ZYP is a rhythmic leaning Hot A/C. They are not CHR. Yet they try to brand themselves as one. Huntsville has not had a real CHR in decades. ZYP is very tight, very heavy recurrent leaning but no rhythmic recurrents & stuff like Rob Thomas every hour. Only a few current songs an hour. Several recurrents that were stiffs. Golds going back to the 80s and 90s. No current rhythmic leaning songs unless it makes it top 10 or so & even sometimes they are still ignored. Very stale imagining. Boring jocks. I could go on & on, but the best way to really understand is to stream it yourself & you will see what I mean. Especially during middays (which has not had a jock on the air in that time slot in years by the way). They in no way sound like a CHR should sound.
Someone mentioned 106.5's small signal, and I was about to respond with 'Just an excuse to pimp iHeartRadio hard'.
It was only then I remembered that WZYP was already on iHR, thanks to Cumulus agreeing to put its stations on Clear Channel's streaming platform.
Awkward!
It was only then I remembered that WZYP was already on iHR, thanks to Cumulus agreeing to put its stations on Clear Channel's streaming platform.
Awkward!
Better still, take a look at the RadioDiscussions CHR boards for some of the older threads talking about Cumulus CHRs. Even without WZYP's 'cautious' music history, Cumulus has a demonstrated hesitance to play select rhythmic songs compared to other big broadcasters. That has been definitely part of my concern toward Cumulus doing its end-around purchase of the former 97.5 WABB (now WABD).TALLRED said:
I know it doesn't get into Huntsville very clearly, but the Kiss station out of Florence/Decatur sounded really good when I drove through Huntsville earlier this year. I was hoping they would, someday, get a stronger signal into Huntsville.
Yea their signal is pretty much nonexistent in Huntsville. You can sometimes pull it in in Madison and I've gotten it in Harvest before but really you can't pick it up consistantly well enough to listen to it until you get to the county line and further west. It's a decent station, but I have a few issues with it. It's rhythmic leaning, which I don't care that much for, but I understand why they are going that route in the Florence area with them having no urban of their own and Star 94.9 being mainstream. They tend to hold onto songs in rotation, that didn't really perform well, way longer than they should be played. Sometimes I think, why are you guys still playing this song, noone really liked it? I've heard a few songs from time to time that were just stiffs too. They shouldn't be giving anyone any reason to want to change the channel because of unfamiliar or unliked music. Sometimes their clocks need a little tweeking too. I know this is irrelevant now, but did anyone hear the Christmas music they were playing? Classic country Christmas music. What??? It was SO out of place and sounded horrible. With all the new Christmas music out from relevant artists of today, why in the hell was 102.7 Kiss FM playing CLASSIC COUNTRY Christmas songs??? Anyways, I'll get off my soap box now lol. All in all, for a small market CHR, they are pretty good.
On the topic of 106.5 Kiss FM. So far so good. I'm already hearing a LOT of buzz about it around town. I was a little surprised they went with the Kiss name with 102.7 being so close and overlapping one another a little, but I won't complain.
On the topic of 106.5 Kiss FM. So far so good. I'm already hearing a LOT of buzz about it around town. I was a little surprised they went with the Kiss name with 102.7 being so close and overlapping one another a little, but I won't complain.
Just noticed this today when I caught the legal ID that they are IDing the translator as "W293AH, Normal." I'm confused and maybe someone can help me out. I thought the community of license used to be Normal but changed to Huntsville some time ago.??? I looked at the application history and it was originally applied for and granted with community of license as Normal. It was changed and granted on 1/11/2000 as Huntsville. If you search it on FCC's site it comes up as Huntsville, but if you look at the last application on file, its a license renewal granted on 3/23/2012 that shows it as Normal again. Recnet shows it as Normal, but radio locator shows it as Huntsville. I remember the legal ID when it was Christmas 106.5 saying Huntsville. So which is it?
Well, it does have calls: W293AH.
Call letters are pretty irrelevant these days unless they're specifically used in the marketing, like KIIS in Los Angeles or WACO in Waco, TX. I think with PPM in the major markets, call letters are even more irrelevant.
Just market it as "Kiss FM" and bury the complicated legal ID (WQRV-HD2 Meridianville, W293AH Huntsville). No one will care.
Call letters are pretty irrelevant these days unless they're specifically used in the marketing, like KIIS in Los Angeles or WACO in Waco, TX. I think with PPM in the major markets, call letters are even more irrelevant.
Just market it as "Kiss FM" and bury the complicated legal ID (WQRV-HD2 Meridianville, W293AH Huntsville). No one will care.
Kent, the post you quoted was deleted for some reason because I can't find it, but you're right. They are stuck with it for now.
Zach, has a point too though, it's really irrelevant these days. They used to only call stations by names that made sense with the calls like KIIS being Kiss FM or WPWR being Power. Granted there are still many station that do this, but these days it can have nothing at all to do with the name, like WWFA being Kiss-FM as well. Before I found out 106.5 was going to be a "Kiss-FM" station, I had kinda thought they might call it "Q 106.5" or something like that to utilize the calls they would have to use when IDing WQRV HD2, but I guess not. I guess that's the old school style in me still trying to hang on lol. Maybe the long term plan (if the station performs well enough) is to move it to a bigger frequency in the future so they didn't want the name to have ties to WQRV. Maybe there is no long term plan and they are just having fun with a translator. Who knows what CC has up their sleeve. But you're right, no one really cares about calls anymore except us radio geeks. Most people don't even notice the call letters at the legal ID. I'll bet if you go to Florence and ask any random 102.7 Kiss-Fm listener what the call letters of that station is they'd have no clue.
Zach, they are IDing W293AH as Normal, AL instead of Huntsville. Refer to my earlier post above for my confusion on that one.
Zach, has a point too though, it's really irrelevant these days. They used to only call stations by names that made sense with the calls like KIIS being Kiss FM or WPWR being Power. Granted there are still many station that do this, but these days it can have nothing at all to do with the name, like WWFA being Kiss-FM as well. Before I found out 106.5 was going to be a "Kiss-FM" station, I had kinda thought they might call it "Q 106.5" or something like that to utilize the calls they would have to use when IDing WQRV HD2, but I guess not. I guess that's the old school style in me still trying to hang on lol. Maybe the long term plan (if the station performs well enough) is to move it to a bigger frequency in the future so they didn't want the name to have ties to WQRV. Maybe there is no long term plan and they are just having fun with a translator. Who knows what CC has up their sleeve. But you're right, no one really cares about calls anymore except us radio geeks. Most people don't even notice the call letters at the legal ID. I'll bet if you go to Florence and ask any random 102.7 Kiss-Fm listener what the call letters of that station is they'd have no clue.
Zach, they are IDing W293AH as Normal, AL instead of Huntsville. Refer to my earlier post above for my confusion on that one.
RollTide said:
You're right, that is confusing. I can't find anything explaining why the change in city of license or why the FCC hasn't updated anything. They really must not pay attention to the details!
As far as I'm concerned, if they didn't file for a new city of license, it's still Huntsville. But knowing the FCC, either way the station is wrong and should be fined, lol.
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