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All Christmas Music Comes Early to Phoenix on KMLE 107.9 FM HD-2

A

asugeorge1

For those who just can’t wait for 99.9 KESZ to flip to all Christmas music after Halloween, Entercom has flipped their Hot Country 20 format on 107.9 KMLE FM HD-2 to commercial free Christmas music as of today. This indicates to me that they do not plan on going all Christmas on KOOL 94.5 FM again this year because in 2016 and 2017, the former CBS Radio kept KOOL’s classic hits format while flipping KMLE HD-2 to all Christmas for the holiday season. Last year, new owner Entercom flipped KOOL 94.5 to all Christmas and KMLE HD-2 stayed as the Hot Country 20 until mid-December when it flipped to Birds Nest Radio for the forthcoming Phoenix Open. I would expect that to happen again this year right after Christmas to the now all Christmas music format on KMLE 107.9 FM HD-2.

Looks like Entercom learned their lesson last year to not compete with KESZ, something KOAI 95.1 FM The Oasis learned in 2017! Are there any other challengers in Phoenix to 99.9 KESZ’s stranglehold on the all Christmas music format?
 
asugeorge1 said:
Looks like Entercom learned their lesson last year to not compete with KESZ, something KOAI 95.1 FM The Oasis learned in 2017! Are there any other challengers in Phoenix to 99.9 KESZ’s stranglehold on the all Christmas music format?
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Any station who thinks they're going to break that monopoly is ignorant of the history of this market. In KOOL's case they're ignorant of their own history. The station tried this before. I think it was maybe in 2008? Anyway, it failed pretty spectacularly and impacted their ratings for at least the next book. Every other station that's tried has failed. It's like going up against Google in the search engine business.
 
asugeorge1 said:
The question is, will anyone else in Phoenix try to challenge 99.9 KESZ and their highly popular Christmas format?
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Sure, it'll happen when Santa takes up residency in Buckeye!
 
For KEZ, their Christmas music format MUST include playing the following songs 2 times per hour:

Rockin' around the Christmas tree...Brenda Lee
Have a holly Jolly Christmas...Burl Ives
It's the most wonderful time of the year...Andy Williams
Jingle Bell Rock... Bobby Helms or Hall & Oats

No joke. They had KEZ on the radio at my work, and they play the crap out of these songs. (they must be "Beth approved"?)
 
Billkex said:
For KEZ, their Christmas music format MUST include playing the following songs 2 times per hour:

Rockin' around the Christmas tree...Brenda Lee
Have a holly Jolly Christmas...Burl Ives
It's the most wonderful time of the year...Andy Williams
Jingle Bell Rock... Bobby Helms or Hall & Oats

No joke. They had KEZ on the radio at my work, and they play the crap out of these songs. (they must be "Beth approved"?)
Click to expand...

But absolutely no religion-based carols, at least up until Sunday, and since then only very few.

But as I said on another similar-themed thread, a good 1/3 of the music is from the 1940s thru the '60s -- geezer-fare that would have aired on KOY 550 or KOOL 960 when those songs were hits. Talk about breaking the format!
 
Billkex said:
For KEZ, their Christmas music format MUST include playing the following songs 2 times per hour:

Rockin' around the Christmas tree...Brenda Lee
Have a holly Jolly Christmas...Burl Ives
It's the most wonderful time of the year...Andy Williams
Jingle Bell Rock... Bobby Helms or Hall & Oats

No joke. They had KEZ on the radio at my work, and they play the crap out of these songs. (they must be "Beth approved"?)
Click to expand...


IIRC, there's like maybe 10 classic Christmas songs altogether. Sure, there might be a Wham "Last Christmas" or Band Aid "Do They Know It's Christmas" thrown in, but when's the last time a new original holiday song got added to the pantheon of tunes that get played every year?

Hmm...
 
Deus Ex Machiato said:
when's the last time a new original holiday song got added to the pantheon of tunes that get played every year?
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Keep in mind that these all-Christmas stations tend to be mostly AC stations that aren't big movers for new music. The purpose of this Christmas format (at least as far as its being done by iHeart) is to be a nostalgia format. They might play recent re-recordings of classics, but not necessarily new compositions. That doesn't mean other stations in other formats aren't playing them.
 
TheBigA said:
Keep in mind that these all-Christmas stations tend to be mostly AC stations that aren't big movers for new music. The purpose of this Christmas format (at least as far as its being done by iHeart) is to be a nostalgia format. They might play recent re-recordings of classics, but not necessarily new compositions. That doesn't mean other stations in other formats aren't playing them.
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The biggest “new” Christmas song that IS played by KEZ and all Christmas stations across the country is Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You” from 1994. It is consistently the #1 Christmas song every Christmas. So I wouldn’t say that all the Christmas music played is “geezer-fare,” but a good amount is.
 
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