> Are they the first station to do today's r&b and old school?
> in 1997 when they launched and the fad format of jammin
> oldies started to come afloat they continued to play new
> music
>
You asked this question about a week ago, sfradio, so hopefully you're still listening. The first example of a similar format in the Bay Area was 98.9 KSOL in the mid 90s. The KSOL call letters had been assigned to Wild 107.7, left over from the station's #1 days in the 1980s, but only mentioned for the legal on-the-hour station ID. During one of the early years of de-regulation, Wild's owners purchased 98.9 and moved the calls down the dial for the "Classic Soul" format -that's when Wild became KYLD. I wasn't in tune with radio ratings at the time, but as far as I know, KSOL at 98.9 was a fairly popular station. A couple of years later, when Clear Channel sucked up the world, they bought KYLD, but sold 98.9 and 99.1 (Wild South Bay simulcast)to their current owners. As I remember, there was a lag time of about a year before the format came back...after CC merged with AM/FM, owners of K-Big 98.1 (KBGG)- probably about 1998. When Kiss-FM signed on, they did a lot of promotions saying the format was "customized for the Bay Area." But to me, it sounded almost identical to KSOL. Their original slogan was "Today's R&B and Classic Soul," though it was virtually all "souldies," very little current R&B. Since then, the format has morphed away from strict "old school" (soul). Lately, I've heard Wham, Madonna, etc. on the station. But they do seem to play more "Today's R&B" than they used to.
