WPTY (FM) - History

History

The station signed on the air on May 27, 1998 as WXXP under the leadership of Skyy (WKTU, BPM). Their studio was based in the same building as WLIR in Garden City, New York. At first, the station sounded similar to New York's rhythmic AC WKTU in format as they were playing older dance material. However as time went on, Party 105's playlist began to add on newer, cutting-edge dance music (house music, trance, freestyle), at times being ahead, and began serving the area with a cutting-edge dance direction, which would prove popular with listeners in the area and gave them an alternative to similarly formatted WKTU, which is also heard in the area. Despite being a Dance station it also ventured into the Rhythmic Top 40 arena as well but kept the Dance product intact.

At one time, as WLIR an alternative rock station was experimenting with dance music sounds on their 92.7 frequency, that a grass roots campaign was created, by dance music fans, to have Party 105 simulcast the station on 92.7 since both stations were owned by Jarad and those that lived west of the weak 105.3 signal in New York City could hear the cutting edge station. However, on January 9, 2004, Univision brought the 92.7 frequency to create WZAA, which simulcasts New York radio station WCAA, otherwise known as La Kalle, with an urban Spanish format, mainly consisting of reggaeton. Interestingly enough, in early February 2008, WNYZ of New York City reformatted, becoming "Pulse 87". WNYZ at the time was the only FM station in New York City carrying a Rhythmic/Dance format. It played some of the newer, cutting-edge dance music not normally heard on WKTU.

On January 12, 2004 the station picked up the call letters of the former WDRE, but kept the Dance format intact.

In late 2004, as WBEA changed format to become "Blaze 101.7", Long Island's first hip-hop station, Party 105.3 added more hip-hop, R&B and reggaeton to the format while removing the majority of the dance music aspect, which infuriated the dance music fan base that relied heavily on the station for dance music since the New York City stations weren't cutting edge. In May 2005, Party 105.3 reversed this trend and began playing more dance music than they had in the past. In 2008 WBEA returned to a Top 40/CHR direction, leaving WDRE as Long Island's lone Rhythmic/Dance outlet.

On September 15, 2005 owners The Morey Organization (TMO) changed the format of its stations (along with 107.1 WLIR and 98.5 WBON). 105.3 became Top 40 "FM Channel 105, Party Hits". The on-air staff was fired and the new format ran with limited commercials, with each programming hour sponsored by an individual advertiser. But the switch did not generate adequate revenue and by December 19, 2005 TMO returned to the Dance format and the "Party 105.3" moniker.

After the return to Dance, the station became more dance music intensive often playing material that New York City Station WKTU did not play or added late. After WKTU changed their format to Rhythmic Adult Contemporary on September 9, 2006, Party 105.3 changed their promos stating that they were "New York's ONLY Dance Music Station", but by September 2007 they decided to cut back on the heavy amount of Dance product by balancing the current music mix with Rhythmic Hip-Hop fare under new operations manager Vic Latino, an alumnus of WKTU and BPM.

On December 26, 2006 BusinessTalkRadio.net President and Chief Executive Officer Michael Metter announced the purchases WLIR, WBON, and WDRE for an undisclosed price but the sales were never completed.

On January 1, 2008, a simulcast was added via a translator at 101.5 MHZ in Plainview, New York. This simulcast covered parts of Nassau and Western Suffolk counties not reached by the 105.3 signal.

On March 9, 2009 WDRE was added to the R&R Rhythmic Airplay Panel, making them the only reporter on the Dance/Mix Show Airplay panel to be a dual reporter.

On October 7, 2009, WDRE was sold to JVC Media LLC by the Morey Organization. The station adopted the WPTY callsign shortly afterward on October 28, 2009. On October 30, 2009, it was revealed that JVC took over the audio programming lease of low power TV channel 6, WNYZ-LP, after Mega Media's contract with WNYZ owner Island Broadcasting was terminated due to financial differences between Mega and WNYZ, This resulted in the end of WNYZ's Dance music format. WPTY began simulcasting the 105.3 signal over WNYZ-LP TV channel 6 and its 87.7 FM audio frequency on November 2, 2009 and adopted the new slogan "Party FM - Your Party Music Leader." Five years after dance music fans had campaigned for the relaying of Party 105 for New York City via the 92.7 frequency, the simulcast of the station finally became a reality, albeit on a different frequency. On January 21, 2010, JVC terminated the WNYZ-LP simulcast arrangement due to the fact that JVC media was negotiating a purchase of two new FM signals in the market and the LMA with WNYZ would place the group above the FCC ownership limits. On March 25, 2011, the 101.5 signal was dropped in Nassau and was replaced by a broadcast signal owned by WLTW.

On October 18, 2011 WPTY changed their format to gold based rhythmic adult contemporary, reverting back to the "Party 105.3" branding. However, after nearly seven months into the format WPTY began returning to a Dance Top 40 direction in late April 2012 with less Rhythmic and Dance gold and recurrents.