KBFB (97.9 FM) is a

commercial radio Commercial broadcasting (also called private broadcasting) is the broadcasting of television programs and radio programming by privately owned corporate media, as opposed to state sponsorship, for example. It was the United States' first model ...

station with an

urban contemporary Urban contemporary music, also known as urban music, urban pop, or just simply urban, is a music radio format. The term was coined by New York radio DJ Frankie Crocker in the early to mid-1970s as a synonym for Black music. Urban contemporary r ...

–leaning

rhythmic contemporary Rhythmic contemporary, also known as Rhythmic Top 20, Rhythmic Top 30, Rhythmic Top 40, Rhythmic CHR or rhythmic crossover, is a primarily American music-radio format that includes a mix of EDM, upbeat rhythmic pop, hip-hop and upbeat R&B hit ...

radio format A radio format or programming format (not to be confused with broadcast programming) describes the overall content broadcast on a radio station. The radio format emerged mainly in the United States in the 1950s, at a time when Radio broadcasting, ...

, known as "97.9 The Beat." It is licensed to

Dallas, Texas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

and serves the

Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex The Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, officially designated Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, is the most populous metropolitan statistical area in the U.S. state of Texas and the Southern United States, ...

. KBFB is owned by Urban One, its studios and offices, along with

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

KZMJ, are in the Galleria Area in North Dallas. KBFB has an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would ha ...

(ERP) of 100,000 watts. The station's

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter (often abbreviated as XMTR or TX in technical documents) is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna with the purpose of sig ...

is off Plateau Street in Cedar Hill, amid the

towers A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...

for other Dallas–Fort Worth area FM and TV stations. KBFB broadcasts using

HD Radio HD Radio (HDR) is a trademark for in-band on-channel (IBOC) digital radio broadcast technology. HD radio generally simulcast, simulcasts an existing analog radio station in digital format with less noise and with additional text information. HD R ...

technology.

History

The Belo/Cox years

The station traces its history back to an October 5, 1946

sign-on A sign-on (or start-up in Commonwealth countries except Canada) is the beginning of operations for a radio or television station, generally at the start of each day. It is the opposite of a sign-off (or closedown in Commonwealth countries exce ...

, owned by the

Belo Corporation Belo Corporation (; formerly A. H. Belo Corporation) was a Dallas, Texas-based media company that owned 20 commercial broadcasting television stations and three regional 24-hour news cycle, 24-hour United States cable news, cable news televisio ...

, and was the first FM radio station to go on the air in Texas. It was called KERA-FM, unrelated to today's public media operation in Dallas using the KERA-TV (channel 13) calls (its current-day FM operation at 90.1 is called KERA without a suffix). Even before KERA-FM's first day on the air, there was an experimental FM station "W5X1C" that began tests on October 15, 1945, and another trial dating back to 1939. By 1947, KERA-FM had moved from its original home at 94.3 FM to 97.9 FM under the WFAA-FM call sign, initially simulcasting its AM sister station

WFAA WFAA (channel 8) is a television station licensed to Dallas, Texas, United States, serving as the American Broadcasting Company, ABC affiliate for the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. It is owned by Tegna Inc. alongside Decatur, Texas, Decatur-li ...

(570 AM). With FM broadcasting in its infancy, Belo decided that the FM simulcast was not worthwhile and took WFAA-FM off the air on September 1, 1950. The frequency remained dormant until 1958, when Belo decided to revive WFAA-FM, receiving a

construction permit Planning permission or building permit refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. House building permits, for example, are subject to bu ...

and putting WFAA-FM back on the air on January 6, 1961. After simulcasting WFAA(AM) for a few years, a Beautiful Music format was established in 1965. The station played quarter-hour sweeps of mostly instrumental

cover version In popular music, a cover version, cover song, remake, revival, or simply cover is a new performance or recording by a musician other than the original performer or composer of the song. Originally, it referred to a version of a song release ...

s of popular songs, designed for relaxing or unobtrusive office listening. On September 16, 1973, WFAA-FM flipped to

album-oriented rock Album-oriented rock (AOR, originally called album-oriented radio) is an FM radio format created in the United States in the late 1960s that focuses on the full repertoire of rock albums and is currently associated with classic rock. US rad ...

(AOR) as KZEW-FM, known to listeners as "The Zoo". It featured disc jockeys such as John LaBella and John Rody ("LaBella and Rody"), George Gimarc, Charley Jones, Dave Lee Austin, John B. Wells, Nancy Johnson, John Dew, John Dillon, Doc Morgan and Tempie Lindsey. The station's concept and programming were initially under the direction of Ira Lipson. The FM station shared studios with WFAA on the second floor of the facility. The FM station was so popular that in several years, WFAA switched to a

classic rock Classic rock is a radio format that developed from the album-oriented rock (AOR) format in the early 1980s. In the United States, it comprises rock music ranging generally from the mid-1960s through the early-1990s, primarily focusing on comm ...

format as KRQX. KLRX Lite 979

In 1987, KZEW and KRQX were sold by Belo (which retained ownership of the ''

Dallas Morning News ''The Dallas Morning News'' is a daily newspaper serving the Dallas–Fort Worth area of Texas, with an average print circulation in 2022 of 65,369. It was founded on October 1, 1885, by Alfred Horatio Belo as a satellite publication of the ' ...

'' and WFAA-TV) to

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

-based

Cox Radio CMG Media Corporation (doing business as Cox Media Group) is an American media conglomerate principally owned by Apollo Global Management in conjunction with Cox Enterprises, which maintains a 29% minority stake in the company. The company p ...

. On December 11, 1989, KZEW dropped the rock format and began stunting with

Christmas music Christmas music comprises a variety of Music genre, genres of music regularly performed or heard around the Christmas and holiday season, Christmas season. Music associated with Christmas may be purely instrumental, or in the case of Christmas ...

. On January 1, 1990, KZEW switched formats to

soft adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

, changing its

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally as ...

to KKWM and rebranded as "Warm 97.9". A year later, the station changed its call sign again, this time to KLRX, and updated their branding to "Lite 97.9".

The Infinity/CBS years

In 1993, the station was sold to CBS Radio, and on October 15, at 7 pm, KLRX flipped to a classic hits/

format under the KRRW call letters, branded as "

Arrow An arrow is a fin-stabilized projectile launched by a bow. A typical arrow usually consists of a long, stiff, straight shaft with a weighty (and usually sharp and pointed) arrowhead attached to the front end, multiple fin-like stabilizers c ...

97.9". On April 3, 1997, the station switched back to adult contemporary as ''B-97.9'' and changed to the current KBFB call letters.

Rhythmic Contemporary

KBFB flipped to

Rhythmic Contemporary Rhythmic contemporary, also known as Rhythmic Top 20, Rhythmic Top 30, Rhythmic Top 40, Rhythmic CHR or rhythmic crossover, is a primarily American music-radio format that includes a mix of EDM, upbeat rhythmic pop, hip-hop and upbeat R&B hit ...

as "97.9 The Beat" on September 26, 2000, after the station was sold to Radio One, a forerunner to today's Urban One. Since launch, the station has been in direct competition against longtime heritage urban station KKDA-FM. KBFB and KKDA-FM also had a competitor with former

rival KZZA until the station flipped to Spanish Oldies in 2008. In the beginning, the morning show on the station was hosted by Russ Parr (who started his radio career at KJMZ in the Metroplex). In 2003, it was home to the '' Steve Harvey Morning Show'' through a syndicated simulcast from its sister station in Los Angeles, KKBT (also nicknamed "The Beat"). Eventually, Radio One switched KBFB's early slot to the ''

Rickey Smiley Broderick Dornell "Rickey" Smiley (born August 10, 1968) is an American stand-up comedian, television host, actor, and radio personality known for his prank phone calls. The calls feature Smiley disguising his voice carrying a conversation wit ...

Morning Show'' in 2005. Smiley was dropped in fall 2017, and was replaced with ''The Morning Hustle''.

HD programming

Since the mid 2000s, KBFB has broadcast on

, though it never had a secondary HD multicast until March 2014. Since that time, KBFB-HD2 has simulcast Gainesville–based sister station KZMJ. In February 2018, the station began broadcasting Vietnamese–language programming on HD3. This was later switched to a Spanish Christian format, also simulcasting on translators K293CM on 106.5 FM in Dallas and K225BR 92.9 FM in

Fort Worth Fort Worth is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Tarrant County, Texas, Tarrant County, covering nearly into Denton County, Texas, Denton, Johnson County, Texas, Johnson, Parker County, Texas, Parker, and Wise County, Te ...

References

External links

*
DFWRadioArchives

DFW Radio/TV History
{{coord, 32.584, N, 96.964, W, type:landmark_region:US_source:FCC, display=title 1947 establishments in Texas Radio stations established in 1947 BFB Rhythmic contemporary radio stations in the United States Urban One stations