KRST
Radio station in Albuquerque, New Mexico
KRST (92.3 FM) is a commercial radio station in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It is owned by Cumulus Media and airs a country music radio format. The radio studios and offices are located in Downtown Albuquerque.
KRST has an effective radiated power (ERP) of 22,000 watts. The transmitter tower is atop Sandia Crest east of the city. The call sign KRST represents the word "Crest", substituting a K for the C and omitting the E.
01History
Progressive rock
On September 16, 1965, KRST first signed on the air. It was owned by Burroughs Broadcasting, along with KRZY (1450 AM), then a country music station. KRST had separate programming from its AM counterpart, playing a free form progressive rock format beginning in the summer of 1970.
Over time, KRST moved from its freeform format to a more structured album rock format, playing the most popular tracks from top-selling rock albums.
Country
With the release of the 1980 hit movie Urban Cowboy, many FM stations around the U.S. were considering switching to country music, which was gaining acceptance outside rural communities. Since co-owned AM station KRZY had been playing a more traditional country format, management decided to put a modern country format on KRST. In the early 1980s, the station made the switch. Albuquerque radio listeners made KRST one of the market's highest rated FM stations.
In 1996, Citadel Broadcasting acquired KRST and KRZY. (KRZY has since been spun off to Entravision Broadcasting.) Citadel was later merged into current owner Cumulus Media.
Nash FM
On May 30, 2014, Cumulus Media expanded the "Nash FM" brand to Albuquerque, as KRST rebranded as "Nash FM 92.3". The conversion of KRST to Nash was part of Cumulus' plans to have their Country outlets adopt a national based brand using a combination of syndicated and local content, similar to Clear Channel Communications' Top 40/CHR "Kiss-FM" model. The conversion also resulted in several KRST air staffers (except for Juan Velasco) being let go, including "The Get Up Gang" morning show.
After five years, Cumulus rebranded the station back to "92.3 KRST" in June 2019.
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “KRST”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- KRST logo.png by Unknown author, Fair use
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