Previous Format: Country “Country 103.5” WYNY
New Format: Dance CHR “103.5 KTU” WKTU
Date & Time Of Change: February 1, 1996
More Info: Wikipedia

Related Changes: 103.5 WYNY Becomes Dance CHR WKTU

Previous Format: Alternative “101-9 RXP” WRXP
New Format: News “101.9 FM News” WEMP
Date & Time Of Change: July 14, 2011 at 10:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

Related Changes: WQCD Becomes WRXP, WRXP Begins Stunting

Previous Format: Alternative “101-9 RXP”
New Format: Stunting “101.9 FM New” (Became News “101.9 FM News” WEMP in August)
Date & Time Of Change: July 15, 2011 at 5:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

Related Airchecks: WQCD Becomes WRXP, WRXP Says Goodbye

Previous Format: Dance CHR “Pulse 87″
New Format: Rhythmic CHR “Party-FM”
Date & Time Of Change: October 30, 2009 at 5:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

Aircheck Contributed by Tony Santiago

Previous Format: Classical WQXR
New Format: Spanish CHR “X96.3″ WXNY
Date & Time Of Change: October 8, 2009 at 8:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

Related Changes: WQXR Moves From 96.3 To 105.9

Previous Format: Spanish CHR “La Kalle 105.9” WCAA
New Format: Classical WQXR
Date & Time Of Change: October 8, 2009 at 8:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

Related Changes: 105.9 WCAA Moves To 96.3

For much its life, WXRK “92.3 K-Rock” was synonymous with Howard Stern. Stern joined the station in 1986 and it was his flagship until he left for Sirius at the end of 2005. Outside of Stern, the station’s identity was always evolving. It started out as Classic Rock, shifted to Alternative, and later Active Rock before bouncing back and forth between all three until it flipped to Talk as “Free-FM” at the beginning of 2006.

When the talk format didn’t pick up steam, the station reverted to the “K-Rock” brand in May 2007. Outside of Opie & Anthony in the mornings, the station continued to struggle in the ratings as the stations identity had been lost due to the constant musical shifts and its target audience’s usage of newer technologies to access the music it wanted.

Following the launch of sister “Amp Radio” in February 2009, rumors abounded about CBS debuting a similar station in New York. Those came true on March 11, 2009 as CBS debuted “92.3 Now” going head-on against Clear Channel’s Z100.

Previous Format: Smooth Jazz
New Format: Rock
Date & Time Of Change: February 5, 2008 at 4:00pm
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

When Dan Mason returned as President of CBS Radio in the Spring of 2007, the first thing he did was make it clear that many of the blunders of the past few years needed to be fixed. The “Free-FM” brand was slowly dissolved, leading to the return of K-Rock. San Francisco’s KFRC was relaunched on a new frequency just a few months after that station had dropped its heritage format. All that remained was dealing with that pesky Jack in New York.

On July 12, 2007 at appropriately 1:01pm, Jack shifted over to 101.1′s HD-2 signal and made way for the return of a slightly modified WCBS-FM. Dan Taylor and Bob Shannon were brought back, but were joined by newcomers Broadway Bill Lee, Joe Causi and more 80′s music.

Note: This is quite long, running at almost 27 minutes, but well worth it. Features the end of Jack, complete CBS-FM musical timeline and the first few jock breaks.

” Nappy Headed **** ”

Three words that shook the number one radio market and the industry as a whole. We all know about Don Imus’ misguided comments and the uproar it caused. The trickle down effect would directly lead to this and other format changes across the country including WSBG Stroudsburg and KIFR San Francisco as stations dealt with how to handle so-called “shock jocks” or others who were caught for saying supposedly offensive comments.

CBS Radio was most directly caught in the crosshairs of the Imus/Shock Jock issue. They were still looking to replace Imus on WFAN while having to deal with multiple issues at WFNY. Midday hosts JV and Elvis were let go for a bit taken offense to by Asian groups. Morning hosts Opie and Anthony were suspended for a month by XM for a bit and their response to the outcry. Looking to distance themselves not only from the “shock jock” mentality, but also from the costs associated from running a locally oriented talk format with low ratings began dropping the format that had begun in earnest in January 2006.

With that, on May 24, 2007 leading into Memorial Day weekend, CBS dropped the Free-FM programming in New York at 9am following Opie and Anthony’s morning show. Until 5pm, the station stunted with random clips of New York audio imagery and comedic versions of rock songs interspliced with sound effects.

At 5pm, station General Manager Tom Chuisano apologized for all the apologies made by talk show hosts recently and for taking K-Rock away in the first place. Opie would later come on announcing that his and Anthony’s syndicated show would remain in mornings on the new format mocking one of K-Rock’s old “From the top of the Howard Stern building” sweepers in the process.

PD John Mainelli and hosts Nick Dipaolo, The Radio Chick, and Ron & Fez along with syndicated shows Loveline and John & Jeff were all let go with the changeover.