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ENGLISH FORMATS IN MEXICO

R

RunWithScissors

Guest
I am curious, are there any Hard Rock, Metal, Alternative, Classic Rock, Punk, Grunge or main stream Rock full time stations/formats in Mexico, with an all English speaking staff of jocks, liners and promotions. I know back in the day Wolfman Jack was a jock on a full time english speaking top 40/oldies station somewhere across the Mexican border.
 
RunWithScissors said:
I am curious, are there any Hard Rock, Metal, Alternative, Classic Rock, Punk, Grunge or main stream Rock full time stations/formats in Mexico, with an all English speaking staff of jocks, liners and promotions. I know back in the day Wolfman Jack was a jock on a full time english speaking top 40/oldies station somewhere across the Mexican border.
Click to expand...

For a station to be in something other than the predominant language of a country, you have to have enough speakers of that language in the country to support it.

Mexico used to have stations in Mexico City in English aimed at the expat American and British business community. Today, nearly all business managers are Mexican, not "imports" so there is no need for the station, and it disappeared in the early 90's... after nearly 30 years.

In the 70's, one of the FMs in Guadalajara did Beautiful Music for the retiree community just south of that city. Today, FM is too valuable to use for such a small niche market, and they are all in Spanish (Guadalajara has 6 million population, while the retiree community is a hundred thousand or so, and on fixed incomes, mostly).

The border stations in English going back to the 30's were all in towns on the US border, and had no interest in Mexican audience. What they had was higher power, usually, than licensed in the US, and the ability to cover lots of US territory at night without FCC control. Today, many FMs in Tijuana, Cd. Juárez, etc., program in English for the US border market, for the same reasons.

There are Spanish laguage stations all over Mexico (and Latin America) that play US rock or pop or AC or oldies with DJs in Spanish and commercials in Spanish. This has been the case for the last 50 years. None are as niched as to distinguish between kinds of rock. Many also mix Spanish language rock with the English stuff.

San Juan, PR, used to have one or two all English CHRs, from the late 60's well into the 70's, as well as an MOR/AC community station. Today, they only have one English language station talk station (all satellite) in this US Commonwealth, as, like Mexico, the "continentals" are a tiny percentage of the population and everyone else is Spanish speaking. I can't think of any other English language station in Spanish speaking Latin America; there are hundreds in Quechua, Amayrá, Guaraní, Náhuatl, Mayan, Tarasco, etc., though
 
About Mexico, technically there are several border stations that have English language formats but are licensed to Mexico. Especially true in Tijuana (which serve the San Diege market) and, to a lesser extent, Juarez (which serve the El Paso market).

San Jose, Costa Rica has a full time English AOR station at 107.5 (that's the ID, 107.5). Also, a popular AC-formatted station there (Radio 2 - 99.5) has an English-language morning show on weekdays. It's been on for at least 4 years, and it attracts ad revenue - so I guess it does OK. Also, you hear a bit of English now and then on hip hop Beat 105.9 and modern AC Best-fm 103.5.

That's not counting the english-based formats that David was referring to, which can also be heard in any other big city in Latin America. You'd be surprised at the places where you hear formats that play the same music as you'd hear on an AC or CHR station in the states. I think that these formats - though not huge ratings grabbers - attract the professional classes that have money to spend. So, they have good power ratios and tend to bill well.

About Costa Rica (and most San Jose stations can be heard throughout the country), there is more music variety there than I hear in places like NY, Philly or Boston. Again, you would be very surprised at what is available on the FM dial there.
 
David:
First, Feliz Navidad y feliz 2007

I have to ask, I hear from Glenn hausre and his show World of radio that Mexico has been testing a short wave radio station, any further word .
 
Look to Tijuana

TJ has 6 FM and 3 AM stations in English. Most of them are aimed at San Diego:

90.3 -- Z90 (R&B/hip-hop)
90.7 -- XLNC (classical music, including the Metropolitan Opera)
91.1 -- 91X (modern rock for over 25 years)
92.5 -- Magic 92.5 (R&B)
98.9 -- Blazin' 98.9 (hip-hop)
105.7 -- XX Sports Radio (// AM 1090)
540 -- 540 Country (C&W, aimed at Los Angeles)
800 -- ESPN 800 (will carry the Super Bowl radio broadcast)
1090 -- XX Sports Radio (flagship for the Padres and San Diego State)

Fred Cantu has a most valuable website for Mexico Radio-TV. Scroll to the bottom for TJ radio and links to their websites.
 
This is an old, old thread, but I think it may be worth commenting on. In my listening area, there are three FM's with SIGNIFICANT amounts of English on them. 1) Radio Imagen (national format, but heard locally on XHMIG) has a half an hour news broadcast every day with Ana Maria Salazar entirely in English. There are also a couple of JACK FM wanna-bes from Leon, GTO. One is Promomedio's Blue-FM, which is entirely automated (XHOI) and (XHVLO), called "The Soundtrack of your Life." Both station's imaging is 95% in English (Be Nice, Be Blue, Blue FM). The music is 100 percent English and the recorded time checks on 101.5 ("Soundtrack") are in English, although their jocks speak Spanish. Sometimes I will hear a feeble attempt at a 100 percent English commercial, which sounds a little strange, but interesting. Blue FM does carry an hour of local talk at night in Spanish. Both stations have a massively large playlist (believe me, even those who like big playlists would cringe, I heard Demis Rousos and Gin Blossoms in the same hour on Blue FM and the Beach Boys and Guns 'n' Roses in the same hour on 101.5).
Whoever does Blue-FM's imaging does not have an accent and sounds fairly decent. The V/O guy who does "Soundtrack" also does imaging for Grupo Imagen and has somewhat of an accent. Sounds like a Mexican Mitch Craig.

These stations are targeting the upper income demographic, in which 50+ percent speak English. In fact, where I live, if I chose to not speak Spanish, I would have no problem at all. There is even a local cable channel with local English news, an English language newspaper and about 5 smaller English language magazines. Doc Severinson lives down the street from me. But keep in mind I also live in a resort town.
 
Seems like I used to listen to one in Monterrey a few years ago when my dad was doing business down there like on 92.5 or something?
 
92.5 in Monterrey? That was Stereorey. It was a great format for many years... but like the giant beautiful music FMs in the USA... it's time passed.
 
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