Music Format

New gig: Tim Conway Jr., who lost his talk show at KLSX-FM (97.1) when the station switched to a music format Feb. 20, has been hired by KABC-AM (790) to host "The Al Rantel Show" while its namesake recovers from surgery. Conway will be heard weeknights 7-11 p.m. beginning Wednesday.

Top 40 station KIIS-FM (102.7) hit the top of the radio ratings last month - a perch it has held or shared every month since April - but the king of pop expects to be dethroned in the near future, as Justin Bieber and Rihanna are no match for Bing Crosby or "Linus and Lucy. " KIIS garnered 5.5% of the Los Angeles-Orange County listening audience ages 6 and older, according to figures released Tuesday by the Arbitron ratings service. Talk station KFI-AM (640) and adult-contemporary station KBIG-FM (104.3)

KGIL-AM Sold to Owner of KKGO-FM: San Fernando Valley-based radio station KGIL-AM (1260) has been sold to Saul Levine, owner of classical music station KKGO-FM, for just under the asking price of $5 million, KGIL General Manager Tom Mosher said. KGIL's news-talk format will likely switch to a "nostalgia" music format after the first of the year, Mosher said.

New gig: Tim Conway Jr., who lost his talk show at KLSX-FM (97.1) when the station switched to a music format Feb. 20, has been hired by KABC-AM (790) to host "The Al Rantel Show" while its namesake recovers from surgery. Conway will be heard weeknights 7-11 p.m. beginning Wednesday.

What is truly significant about the iPod is not its appearance and style, but that it represents the creation of a portable device that, in theory and in practice, can store and play all music ever recorded ("King of Music Players," Nov. 25). This has profound implications for the music industry and those industries that produce other types of music players. For instance, iPod technology has made the CD format obsolete. CD players, in turn, also are obsolete. In fact, the current business model of the music industry itself has been made obsolete by the digital music format and the accompanying digital music players, such as the iPod.

Tom Dixon, the veteran classical music announcer who worked for KFAC for 40 years, will be back on the air this summer. He has been signed to host a seven-night-a-week 6-10 p.m. program on KKGO-AM (540, stereo) which is targeted to switch to a classical music station in July. Dixon's program will include an 8-10 p.m. "Evening Concert," which was a KFAC staple for many years. Exact date for the start of the classical music format is yet to be set, awaiting installation of new equipment, including a 25,000-watt AM transmitter.

As KFAC dies, KUSC decides to change its classical music format to include other types of music . . . the words which come to my mind are not suitable for a family newspaper. I feel betrayed. I and many other KUSC subscribers send in yearly checks so we can listen to commercial-free classical music. We tolerate "Prairie Home Companion" and the other Saturday-night nonsense, and we put up with some news. KUSC general manager Wallace Smith may want "to attract younger listeners," as he told Colker, but if he isn't careful he will lose his old listeners and their contributions!

The displaced talk jocks of KLSX-FM (97.1) did not go quietly into that good night as the station switched over late Friday afternoon to a Top 40 music format designed to entice younger listeners. Informed midweek that they would be out of a job in only a few days, the station's personalities -- including Adam Carolla, Tom Leykis, Tim Conway Jr. and the team of Frosty, Heidi & Frank -- spent their final on-air hours saying goodbye to fans with emotions ranging from exasperation to sadness to celebration.

An AM radio station has become the first to begin targeting San Diego's Asian community, introducing a format of music in Mandarin Chinese and Vietnamese. New York-based MultiCultural Radio Broadcasting Inc. last week reached an agreement with Jefferson-Pilot Broadcasting, owner of the AM 1240 station. The channel previously broadcast the youth-oriented Radio Disney.

Dance music fans will have a sense of deja vu -- and a sense of loss -- next week when the Southland's "New Party Station" drops its format of Moby, Madonna and Kylie Minogue after less than a year on the air. KDLD in Santa Monica and KDLE in Newport Beach, simulcasting as KDL at 103.1 FM, are scheduled to abandon the dance club cuts for Christmas music on Monday, then sometime after Christmas begin a new format of alternative tunes, the fourth format change in five years. Until 1998, 103.

The displaced talk jocks of KLSX-FM (97.1) did not go quietly into that good night as the station switched over late Friday afternoon to a Top 40 music format designed to entice younger listeners. Informed midweek that they would be out of a job in only a few days, the station's personalities -- including Adam Carolla, Tom Leykis, Tim Conway Jr. and the team of Frosty, Heidi & Frank -- spent their final on-air hours saying goodbye to fans with emotions ranging from exasperation to sadness to celebration.

L.A.'s new game of musical chairs began a few minutes before 6 a.m. Monday. That's when classical radio station 105.1 FM said adios to 18 years of cantatas and sonatas and bid hello to a new era with Brooks & Dunn singing "Believe," a folksy ode to keepin' the faith that heavenly rewards await those who persevere in a world of woe. The station's switch from KMZT, or "K-Mozart," to KKGO, "Go Country 105," brought the Nashville twang back to the L.A.

The Southland on Thursday lost its only country radio station, long-running KZLA-FM (93.9), which introduced a new pop format known as Movin 93.9, where veteran radio personality Rick Dees is poised to return to the local airwaves as the station's morning host. A date has not been set for Dees' debut at the new station, which will replace the twangy hits of Toby Keith, Shania Twain and Tim McGraw with dance-ready music of Beyonce, Gwen Stefani, Gnarls Barkley and other R&B-minded performers.

It's only 345 more days until Christmas and KOST-FM (103.5), and hundreds of other radio stations around the country, can barely wait. Like more than 300 other radio stations across the country, KOST-FM flips to an all-Christmas music format in November, and for the first time many of them rode it to the top, according to the Arbitron ratings released earlier this week. In its fifth year of adopting the holiday format, KOST-FM rocketed from 10th place to first in the quarterly ratings.

What is truly significant about the iPod is not its appearance and style, but that it represents the creation of a portable device that, in theory and in practice, can store and play all music ever recorded ("King of Music Players," Nov. 25). This has profound implications for the music industry and those industries that produce other types of music players. For instance, iPod technology has made the CD format obsolete. CD players, in turn, also are obsolete. In fact, the current business model of the music industry itself has been made obsolete by the digital music format and the accompanying digital music players, such as the iPod.

On a recent Tuesday, rock fans tuning in to a station on the far right of the radio dial were treated to music by the B-52s, Peaches, Ramones and Polyphonic Spree, but they weren't listening to longtime alternative stalwart KROQ. Rather, the station was a little further left on the dial, an alternative alt-rock upstart named Indie 103.1. It wasn't just dance fans who were shocked to hear rock music on what had been known as the "new party station."

Christian radio station KYMS-FM (106.3) is launching a series of format revisions today designed to broaden the station's appeal and give it a new face for the '90s, spokesman Warren Duffy announced Thursday. The station is bolstering its contemporary Christian music format by layering in hourly Christian-oriented news spots, a church community bulletin board and by introducing elements of talk radio. Special promotional events, contests and giveaways also are in the works.

Dance music fans will have a sense of deja vu -- and a sense of loss -- next week when the Southland's "New Party Station" drops its format of Moby, Madonna and Kylie Minogue after less than a year on the air. KDLD in Santa Monica and KDLE in Newport Beach, simulcasting as KDL at 103.1 FM, are scheduled to abandon the dance club cuts for Christmas music on Monday, then sometime after Christmas begin a new format of alternative tunes, the fourth format change in five years. Until 1998, 103.