Radio Power 106 (KPWR)

KPWR (105.9 FM, "Power 106") is a commercial radio station located in Los Angeles, California, broadcasting to the Greater Los Angeles area on an analog signal and in HD Radio. KPWR airs a Rhythmic Contemporary format playing Hip Hop & R&B and Rhythmic Dance Pop105.9 FM signed on as easy listening KFI-FM on July 15, 1946, later becoming KBMS in 1958 before adopting the KWST call letters and "K-West 106" moniker in 1969. During its years as KBMS and later KWST, its format had been beautiful music prior to its flip to a rock format on January 1, 1975. K-West emulated the then-popular sound of KMET & KLOS. By 1981 though, the rating had slipped and KWST had changed to a Top 40 format, and let all of their disc jockeys go. KWST eventually evolved into KMGG, or "Magic 106" in 1983, and played upbeat Adult Contemporary music.In May 1984 Century Broadcasting Decided to sell KMGG and St. Louis's KSHE to Indianapolis Based Emmis Communications.Magic 106 would continue to climb in the ratings, but after seeing a unique niche to counter Top 40s KIIS and KKHR and Urban outlets KDAY, KJLH, and KACE (the latter three all signal challenged), Emmis would flip KMGG from adult contemporary to a dance music/Top 40 direction on January 11, 1986 and became KPWR, "Power 106." Jay Thomas was hired as the new morning host. In its first seven years, the playlist concentrated mostly on an upbeat, party-style mix of dance, house, freestyle, and urban pop while avoiding hard rock. This mix of music became known as crossover, due to the way in which dance and urban music were presented to an audience that liked pop, and vice versa. Around 1992, KPWR began to focus on urban music with hip-hop as the musical base. In 1992 The Baka Boyz came to Power 106 and started the long-running "Friday Night Flavas" late night hip hop mix show. The Friday Night Flavas show passed from the Baka Boyz to the Fantastik 4our crew by 1998, until finally being canceled on January 4, 2008. Sway & King Tech's The Wake Up Show which airs on Sunday evenings has taken the place of Friday Night Flavas as Power 106's underground hip hop mix show.By January 2005, the station had woven in non-R&B/hip hop artists such as Natalie, Baby Bash, NB Ridaz and Gwen Stefani to the mix, resulting in a return to rhythmic contemporary hit radio. The move may have been a response to a change in directions at rival station KIIS, which was programming Top 40 hits, until they started a shift towards a Rhythmic lean, since the market itself is heavily Hispanic and tends to favor this genre.KPWR picked up additional competition in May 2005 when KXOL dropped their Spanish adult contemporary format for a Hispanic Rhythmic, or hurban, format known as "Latino 96.3". The format is a crossover mix of Hispanic hip hop, reggaeton, dancehall, and R & B/hip hop targeting a bilingual audience. However, the abrupt switch violated a transmitter lease agreement that KXOL's parent company, Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS), had with Emmis; the agreement required formal notification to Emmis of any change in format and expressly prohibited KXOL from programming to directly compete with KPWR. SBS switched formats anyway, and Emmis filed a lawsuit to force SBS to either drop the format switch or find a new transmitter. SBS announced that KXOL would move to another transmitter site a month later, and both parties settled the dispute sometime after.Shortly after the debut of Latino 96.3, KPWR replaced the majority of their non Latino DJs with personalities of Latino descent who often pepper their broadcasts with Spanish words, in an effort to regain some of the audience lost to Latino 96.3. Today Big Boy and Fuzzy Fantabulous (both African-American) remain as the only non-Latino personalities at the station.On August 17, 2006, KPWR's Country music sister station KZLA flipped directions to Adult Rhythmic Contemporary as "Movin' 93.9." Most of the songs played on Movin' 93.9 consisted of Rhythmic Pop and Dance hits from the 1980s and 1990s to the present day, along with classic Disco and Freestyle tracks thrown in for balance. But after almost a year in the format, KMVN shifted directions to Rhythmic Oldies.With the unique combination of both KPWR and KZLA, the move gave Emmis and Los Angeles its first Rhythmic duopoly, as well as the second duopoly in California with this arrangement, the other being Clear Channel Communications siblings KMEL and KYLD in San Francisco. But that arrangement ended on April 15, 2009, when KMVN flipped to a Spanish format under a LMA with Grupo Radio Centro of Mexico City.