KEYI

[willdav713]

A while back Austin had a station called KEYI "Austin's KEY" which could be heard all the way down to North side San Antonio, and Spring, Texas.

When did the format take off?

What did it replace?

How many stations competed with KEYI's format?

Around 1994 or so it flipped to Oldies and replaced Froggy 94, what prompted that frequency swap, and station reimaging/branding?

 

[bigroo]

Are you refering to 103.5, now KBPA?

 

[bigroo]

They had the calls of KEYI in 2004

 

[fredcantu]

KEYI started off in the early 70s as KRMH "Karma" on 103.7.
It was an early rimshot licensed to San Marcos but trying to serve Austin. Under the rules back then it had its studios at the transmitter site east of Buda and produced public affairs shows in San Marcos.
By 1980, it was sold to KNOW-AM and became KCSW with a soft AC format.
In the late 80s it shifted to 103.5 and became a personality AC as Key 103 wooing top morning DJ Dave Jarrott away from K98 (KHFI.)
During the rush of consolidation after dereg it became part of Clear Channel or CC's predecessor and had to be spun off because they ended up with too many stations.
When Emmis got the station in the early 90s they went oldies and then Bob FM.
I believe the KBPA calls came with Bob, perhaps meaning "Bob Plays Anything?"

 

[grantchester]

Indeed, Fred, KRMH-FM (for R.Miller Hicks, no relation to Steve or Tom) signed on, from a hill on the north edge of Hays Co. between Buda and Niederwald about 1971. The format was Album Rock. After KLBJ-FM went freeform-progressive, KRMH went Top 40 in 1975. It was sold to Wendell Mays (No relation to Mark, Randall and Lowry) in 1976. The calls were changed to KCSW and the format became A/C. In the early 1980's (84?) the station was bought by Steve Hicks, the frequency moved from 103.7 to 103.5, The calls changed to KEYI and the transmitter moved to the west side of I-35. Despite high ratings, the bust of the second half of the 1980's, the additional stations that moved in (Kileen, luling, georgetown etc etc) and the debt service led GE Capital to re-possess the station. It was bought by Van Henry Archer III who signed a Local Sales Agreement with Clear Channel. CC bought it a few years later after the ownership limits were lifted. They spun it off when they merged with Gulfstar/Capstar/Chancellor/AMFM. I think The Bird Company (Texas Broadcasting Co... LBJ) got it around the turn of the century, but had to let it go when they combined with Sinclair ( KGSR/101X et al) Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Krash Kelly]

Yes, when it was under the CC LMA it was owned by Secret Communications. LBJ/Sinclair bought Oldies 103 from Secret in 2001. Emmis later bought out the LBJ family (I believe in 2003) to form the current Emmis partnership. KEYI flipped to BOB FM on Aug 20, 2004 and changed calls to KBPA.

 

[grantchester]

Thanks Mr Kelly, I got a bit confused after the late 90's. Indeed, CC LSA'ed it in '93, but although they assumed control after '96, the licensee remained 'Secret'(...But I thought they did business as Mercury?) And I was obviously confused about the spin-off. KLBJ-S got it from CC, and it stayed in the cluster after Emmis took over. It must have been 98.9 that was excreted after the mergers...

 

[fredcantu]

I recall 93.3 being part of the mergers that later formed CC Austin. They were top 40 B-93 KBTS still licensed to Killeen when they got bought by format competitor KHFI which had just moved to 96.7 from 98.1 to make way for KVET-FM... and a long list of format changes ensued for 93.3. They were sold to LBJ before 103.5, werent they?

 

[Krash Kelly]

96.7 took over 93.3 in the early 90's when 96.7 was part of The Rusk Group and 93.3 became Mix 93.3. IIRC - CC bought KHFI in '93 and that deal did not include the 93.3 frequency which then went to the LBJ family.

 

[Davidwnc]

Froggy 94.7 changed to Party 94.7 on Monday October 24th, 1994 and KEYI 103.5 flipped to oldies 103 the following Wednesday November 2nd, 1994.. B 93 went away sometime in March of 1992 and I believe shortly flipped to country (Lonestar 93) before the flip to Mix 93.3 and would later in time return to the Lonestar 93 moniker before having all kinds of flips in the 90s. I listened to KEYI as a kid in the mid and late 80s with Dave Jarrett when there was only a handfull of other commercial stations. There was only B 93, Klbj, Capital 94.7 (the country KAT some orchestra station then froggy), Majic 95.5, KQFX 96.7, K 98, Kool 99, Kase 101, Z 102 and Key103. From what I remember Dave J. was the reason that the 390 phone prefix was created and didn't Bob Cole win a car from Dave J too?

 

[willdav713]

Yes, when it was under the CC LMA it was owned by Secret Communications. LBJ/Sinclair bought Oldies 103 from Secret in 2001. Emmis later bought out the LBJ family (I believe in 2003) to form the current Emmis partnership. KEYI flipped to BOB FM on Aug 20, 2004 and changed calls to KBPA.

I still think it was 2001, not 2003 when they did that. Because I was living in West Houston from 2001-9/2002. I remember reading an article about LBJ selling stations to Emmis in 2001 at my West Houston Aparmtent. I will search the Chron Archives online and see if it comes up.

 

[captex]

yes, the good old days. i do remember, keyi key 103 back in the 80's, kmxx mix 93.3 , also 93.3 was a all seventies station for a while, kgtn 97.7 country and then to the kqfx fox 96.7, was kqfx classic rock or oldies(96.5 before changing to 96.7), 107.7,kahk 1077 the hawk, also remember dave jarrot and j r in the morning, debra duncan bo and bama. bob cole on koke-fm 95.5.

 

[beaun]

I guess I missed Mr Kelly's obvious post, today is KBPAs 8th anniversary. Is that longer than the other formats on that frequency?

 

[jd]

Yes, when it was under the CC LMA it was owned by Secret Communications. LBJ/Sinclair bought Oldies 103 from Secret in 2001. Emmis later bought out the LBJ family (I believe in 2003) to form the current Emmis partnership.

I still think it was 2001, not 2003 when they did that. Because I was living in West Houston from 2001-9/2002. I remember reading an article about LBJ selling stations to Emmis in 2001 at my West Houston Aparmtent. I will search the Chron Archives online and see if it comes up.

A review of FCC records shows this ownership time line for 103.5:

2000 Clear Channel to Secret
2001 Secret to Sinclair Telecable
2003 Sinclair Telecable to LBJS Broadcasting Company
2003 LBJS Broadcasting acquired by group owner Emmis Communications Corp. (04/25/03)

 

[willdav713]

yes, the good old days. i do remember, keyi key 103 back in the 80's, kmxx mix 93.3 , also 93.3 was a all seventies station for a while, kgtn 97.7 country and then to the kqfx fox 96.7, was kqfx classic rock or oldies(96.5 before changing to 96.7), 107.7,kahk 1077 the hawk, also remember dave jarrot and j r in the morning, debra duncan bo and bama. bob cole on koke-fm 95.5.

Wasn't that KMMX not KMXX for 93.3? They acquired the calls from KMMX Terrell Hills/San Antonio which flipped to KKYX-FM.

I wish we had an all 70s station now like they did on 93.3.

So during the late 80s Austin had 2 oldies stations 96.7, and 98.9?

What was the difference format wise and music wise that separated KKMJ and KEYI? I couldn't really DX 95.5 back in the 80s in San Antonio as Z-95 out in Corpus came in the strongest so that is why I ask. We folks in San Antonio had 3 at the time (late 80s) KFAN, KQXT (KQ-10Snooze) and K-MIX (KMMX). KFAN somewhat cloned KQXT.

 

[jd]

Wasn't that KMMX not KMXX for 93.3? They acquired the calls from KMMX Terrell Hills/San Antonio which flipped to KKYX-FM.

No, captex is right. The call letters didn't come from San Antonio's 106.7; the KMMX calls did resurface a few months after the switch in Tahoka TX, however.

93.3 was KMXX from September of '92 until early 1996, when it switched to KAJZ.

 

[fredcantu]

So during the late 80s Austin had 2 oldies stations 96.7, and 98.9?

I don't think they had oldies at the same time.
98.9 came into town from Lampasas as oldies KLTD 99.1 "Kool 99."
But I believe it was after KHFI moved from 98.3 to 96.7 and blew out oldies KQFX "The Fox."

 

[Kent]

93.3 was KMXX from September of '92 until early 1996, when it switched to KAJZ.

Actually, the KMXX calls went away in early '94, being replaced by KHHT. The country format started as "Lone Star 93," which kept the KMXX calls, and became "Hot Country 93.3" after getting rid of most, if not all, of the local staff and going satellite. Those calls lasted another couple of years until "Hits 93.3" switched to smooth jazz as "K-Jazz."

 

[Krash Kelly]

And while Mix 93.3 was fairly successful, IIRC Clear Channel didn't want that station to potentially hurt their recently purchased KHFI so part of the deal was to make it change formats so it went country before CC/Capstar owned KVET/KASE.

And back to KEYI at the time - there seemed to be many moving parts, and 'gentleman’s agreements' in these transactions. At one time I believe Heftel/Univision was going to pick up the KEYI signal but that didn't work out. Also, I believe CC had to divest it because WOAI counted against their market caps in Austin because of the 50k signal being city-grade here. I could be wrong, but that is what I remember from the time.

 

[Kent]

And back to KEYI at the time - there seemed to be many moving parts, and 'gentleman’s agreements' in these transactions. At one time I believe Heftel/Univision was going to pick up the KEYI signal but that didn't work out. Also, I believe CC had to divest it because WOAI counted against their market caps in Austin because of the 50k signal being city-grade here. I could be wrong, but that is what I remember from the time.

That may have been part of it, but the DOJ also required a divestiture of KEYI. HBC was originally going to buy it and KKFR 92.3 in Phoenix, but the DOJ nixed the deal because of Clear Channel's then ownership stake in HBC. The DOJ basically said it wasn't illegal for HBC to buy stations in Austin or Phoenix, but it couldn't buy surplus from Clear Channel when it would raise the combined revenue shares of the two companies above a certain point.