Posted on 08/19/2006 4:16:04 PM PDT by summer
...The abrupt switch...left Los Angeles, the nation’s No. 2 radio market, with more than 10 million people, without an area-wide country music station, even as the genre remains a potent force on the Billboard sales charts. It joins New York, the biggest radio market, which has been without a major country station since 1996, and San Francisco, the nation’s No. 4 market, which lost a major country station in 2001.
Paradoxically, Los Angeles consistently ranks as one of the top two markets for country album sales (it accounts for roughly 3 percent of all country sales so far this year) and plays host to the genre’s biggest touring acts. Thursday marked the first night of a sold-out three-night stand by Mr. McGraw and Ms. Hill, country’s power couple, at the Staples Center arena.
But the station’s corporate parent, Emmis, which is based in Indianapolis, concluded that even having the city’s only country station — billed as “America’s most listened-to country station” — was no longer worth it, and that it could do better. The switch to what it calls “rhythmic pop contemporary” was dictated by economic common sense: a country station that draws predominantly white listeners aged 25 to 54 could no longer stay afloat in an ethnically diverse megalopolis. ...
“Country is a tough format to do in a market that is an ethnic melting pot,” said Rick Cummings, Emmis’s president of radio. “The appeal of the format is fairly limited when it comes to ethnicity.” In Los Angeles, he said, stations that cater mostly to white listeners are “playing for less than 25 percent of the marketplace on a good day.”...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Also, there is really so much terrific country music. I know of a market where three country stations compete for listeners, and each has their own slant on country music -- one catering to oldies country, one to newer country, and one with a mix of both old and new.
If the market for CW is strong, it will return on another station.
Well, it never came back in NY, even though Kenny Chesney had no problem whatsoever selling out his shows and the critics loved him, too. And, country music had their big awards televised from NY recently. Still, no country music station in that city for years.
Yet, all these BBQ restaurants are now popping up in NY -- it's as if NY just recently discovered BBQ.
FYI.
FYI.
These articles about country music leaving L.A. are misleading. KFRG (K-FROG) reaches the entire Southern California market. It just doesn't happen to have a physical station located within the borders of L.A. city/county. So country music fans here can still tune into K-FROG to hear their favorites.
Country's too white...and far too Republican.
I don't think country music is too "white", but it might be too "Right" and many of the performers are Christians and patriots. I doubt that sets well in liberal CA. LOL
Well, there is some very good writing in a lot of country music song lyrics. Very heartfelt. People -- all people -- miss out when they don't get a chance to hear those tunes.
Soooo... Rap music caters to more than 25% of the population?
No but, the CMA notwithstanding:
See this link. There are three K-FROG country stations in locations that surround L.A. County. Together, the K-FROG stations reach the entire Southern California area, including the L.A. market. Undoubtedly the K-FROG stations will be the beneficiary of KZLA going to a different format.
In the meantime, instead of being unique within the L.A. market, KZLA becomes just another pop/urban music station in a market croweded with them.
I was there last week and half the dial was mexican. It seems everything about America is changing because of 12 million? illegals.
If country music had half the buying power of 12 million illegals then we would dedicate entire shopping malls to it.
Exactly. Free enterprise will cause someone to come in with a "supply" to fill that "demand".
Meanwhile KZLA jumps into an already well-occupied field and within their format they will become 'one of many'. That's an entirely different position to be in compared to what they have now.
That, and the fact that so much of California is urban...kind of hard to get worked up by lyrics like "Double-clutchin' up and down a country road" or "I made her the queen of mah double-wide trailer".
I live in LA and now we have to listen to KFROG 95.1. A little static, but will do in a pinch. What is this world coming to? :(
With iPods, satellite radio and MP3 disk players there are fewer and fewer listening to music on over the air radio.
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