KTWV - History

History

From the late 1960s until 1987, the 94.7 frequency was home of KMET, a very popular album-oriented rock station owned by Metromedia. Prior to KMET, the station was called KLAC-FM. The station's ratings were high until the early 1980s when it lost ground to the competition. Many observers believe the station's ratings struggles were in large part caused by embracing the advice of New York music consultants and abandoning its identity as the "Soundtrack for Southern California." Specifically, it abandoned the spontaneity of having disc jockeys pick the music to be played on the air. Together with reduced advertising budgets, this resulted in significant ratings drops.

Metromedia sold its TV stations in 1986 and restructured and became known as Metropolitan Broadcasting. By the end of 1986, the rock format on KMET had very low ratings and as a result, the format would end on February 14, 1987.

The station changed to a New Age Music/Soft Rock/Contemporary Jazz format with the nickname "The Wave," with initial focus primarily on non-vocal new age music. Its first song played on the relaunched format was Sting's "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free". During the Wave's new age music period, management told the station employees to refer to The Wave as a "mood service" rather than a "radio station". For the first 19th months there were no live Disc Jockeys, instead "vignettes" done by actors, reflecting everyday occurrences. Ratings were weak and John Sebastian was hired as the new Program Director. On September 19, 1988 live jocks were back. John hired Don Burns, Talaya Trigueros, Keri Tombazian, Amy Hiatt and China Smith.

Over the years, the station moved to more of a Smooth jazz sound. Today, the station is still called "The Wave" and plays a mix of smooth jazz, soft R&B hits, AC songs, and some softer rock hits.

The Wave is often regarded as the first NAC station in the United States. But some media writers disagree, preferring to award that title to KLRS (Colors) in Santa Cruz, CA. KLRS went on the air one month after The Wave, but was the first station in North America to play a true New Age music format, continuing to do so until its demise in 1990.

The era of The Wave has the distinction of being the only time legendary disc jockey J.J. Jackson has ever worked at the station. Jackson was a veteran of then-rival rock station KLOS (while The Wave was still rocker KMET) for ten years, before becoming one of the original "VJ's" (video jockeys) on MTV when the channel debuted in 1981. Jackson was a DJ for a brief time at The Wave in 2004.

KTWV is currently owned by CBS Radio and located in the largest market with a Smooth Jazz station, thanks to the recent demises of WQCD in New York City and WNUA in Chicago (although the format returned to the Chicago airwaves via a new station at 87.7 FM/Channel 6, WKQX-LP "87.7 The L"). It is also the last CBS Radio-owned Smooth Jazz-formatted radio station still in operation (WSJT in the Tampa Bay Area was the other, but it flipped on August 31). However, the station has eliminated the term "Smooth Jazz" from its on-air positioning and added more Urban AC and soft-rock vocals and instrumental covers to its music mix (see below).

When competitor Citadel Broadcasting switched WJZW Smooth Jazz format to oldies, CBS Radio began running ads promoting KTWV's streaming audio on CBS owned stations in the area such as WJFK-FM. There is a Canadian radio station that is named after KTWV's format see CIWV-FM. It is also called 94.7 the Wave.