IHeartMedia Sacramento Brings AC To 92.5 The Breeze

https://www.iheart.com/live/the-breeze-8143/

Update Iheart has released a national edition of the Breeze for listeners outside of Sacramento and San Francisco.

MarioMania said:

I just found out today, I have it on my Memory now

Glad The Breeze came to Sacramento

Click to expand...

I’m so relieved to hear the Breeze in Sacramento. I was beginning to think iHeartRadio was too stubborn to admit that launching a third full powered country station in Sacramento wouldn’t work and held on even afterthe exit of Star 106-5.

It seems that they’ve settled on an air staff... Two Bay Area veterans for mornings and afternoons and woman in the midday that sounds like ( if you close your eyes), Sarah Palin.


I hope the Brreze does as well in Sacramento as 98.1 is doing in the Bay Area.

MarioMania said:

I just found out today, I have it on my Memory now

Glad The Breeze came to Sacramento

Click to expand...

I’m so relieved to hear the Breeze in Sacramento. I was beginning to think iHeartRadio was too stubborn to admit that launching a third full powered country station in Sacramento wouldn’t work and held on even afterthe exit of Star 106-5.


I hope the Brreze does as well in Sacramento as 98.1 is doing in the Bay Area.

Michael Rivers Kramer said:

I’m so relieved to hear the Breeze in Sacramento. I was beginning to think iHeartRadio was too stubborn to admit that launching a third full powered country station in Sacramento wouldn’t work and held on even afterthe exit of Star 106-5.

It seems that they’ve settled on an air staff... Two Bay Area veterans for mornings and afternoons and woman in the midday that sounds like ( if you close your eyes), Sarah Palin.


I hope the Brreze does as well in Sacramento as 98.1 is doing in the Bay Area.

Click to expand...

Tony Sandevol has been around Bay Area radio going way back. I assume most of this new air staff will be VT'ed from San Francisco.

Yawn- God forbid anybody actually try something new and different for a format, especially ClearChannel. There was already a smooth-jazz station called The Breeze back in the 90s, I worked at it for a bit.

When the McClatchy family owned this station decades ago, it had a classical music format and they ran it at a loss for years just because they liked classical music. You never see that kind of thing now. Formats like this are for people who don't seriously like music, they just want something to have on in the background. When I checked it out yesterday I had to laugh at how their IDs said "Making your workday less stressful"- anytime I've worked near anyone who had any station on all day, I've wanted to pound them after hearing the same songs over and over again every day.

Alan Smithee said:

When the McClatchy family owned this station decades ago, it had a classical music format and they ran it at a loss for years just because they liked classical music. You never see that kind of thing now.

Click to expand...

Because nobody wants to spend millions of dollars just to listen to music. They can do it for free.

The ‘lispy’ voice used to promote the station makes me want to tune it out. Also a bit hyper in some of the imaging.

What’s with the upped pitching of certain songs by as much as 2 and 3 percent? I swear I am tuned to a CHR station rather than a true AC station. This hardly promote “easy and relaxing”. Finally, lose the Lady Gaga and other hot AC titles. And Hotel California, eh? This makes the product sound like another crappy hot AC in your face station. Kinda thought “The Breeze” was supposed to be an alternative to that!

Alan Smithee said:

Yawn- God forbid anybody actually try something new and different for a format, especially ClearChannel. There was already a smooth-jazz station called The Breeze back in the 90s, I worked at it for a bit.

When the McClatchy family owned this station decades ago, it had a classical music format and they ran it at a loss for years just because they liked classical music. You never see that kind of thing now. Formats like this are for people who don't seriously like music, they just want something to have on in the background. When I checked it out yesterday I had to laugh at how their IDs said "Making your workday less stressful"- anytime I've worked near anyone who had any station on all day, I've wanted to pound them after hearing the same songs over and over again every day.

Click to expand...

Mediaace,
Thank you! You nailed two points that I remember thinking when listening...the male imaging voice drives me nuts, and yes on the pitching up of songs. Almost like a holdover from Country that no one bothered to turn off. It sounds very strange to hear Soft AC ballads from the 80's pitched up.

radiofan86 said:

Mediaace,
Thank you! You nailed two points that I remember thinking when listening...the male imaging voice drives me nuts, and yes on the pitching up of songs. Almost like a holdover from Country that no one bothered to turn off. It sounds very strange to hear Soft AC ballads from the 80's pitched up.

Click to expand...

Are the few extra seconds an hour REALLY worth funny the music at a higher pitch? Really, why?

How many seconds do they really gain, maybe someone can educate me. JammerDave, tell them to stop that crap!

stewie said:

Are the few extra seconds an hour REALLY worth funny the music at a higher pitch? Really, why?

How many seconds do they really gain, maybe someone can educate me. JammerDave, tell them to stop that crap!

Click to expand...

I wasn't even aware... They seem to know what they are doing with this format.. I'll just stick to engineering. Besides, I doubt that many posting here are even in the target demo, right?

For clarity sake, what is iHeart’s intended target demo of The Breeze?

jammerdave said:

I wasn't even aware... They seem to know what they are doing with this format.. I'll just stick to engineering. Besides, I doubt that many posting here are even in the target demo, right?

Click to expand...

Mediaace said:

For clarity sake, what is iHeart’s intended target demo of The Breeze?

Click to expand...

From the music mix, I'd say the upper end of 25-54, with enough of the lower end that might want a change of pace from the thump-thump-thump of Hot AC to make up for the presence of the 55+ folks nobody wants.

jammerdave said:

I wasn't even aware... They seem to know what they are doing with this format.. I'll just stick to engineering. Besides, I doubt that many posting here are even in the target demo, right?

Click to expand...

I was the APD/MD of KGBY in the late 90's when we pitched up the music at 2%. I don't hear The Breeze pitched up at all when I listen on line and compare the same songs side by side with the music stored on my phone. I do not believe they pitch it up at all. Why would they since they aren't worried about tempo. This is truly a Soft AC station.

We pitched up the music on Y-92 + 2%, to make the station sound brighter than KYMX and K-108 before that. We promoted Y-92 as an upbeat, "Bright AC" with our Motto "Picks You Up and Makes You Feel Good" Our positioning.., "Paul and Phil in the Morning, Today's Hits and Yesterday's Favorites All Day, 92.5, Y-92!"

We had a rule when I programmed the music, not to play any ballads back to back. It was challenging to say the least, when 60 percent of the playlist at Mood level "1". Listeners said they liked the uptempo feel of, Y-92, but the highest testing songs were and are ballads. It's all about the passion.

I'm 54 and will age out of the 25-54 demo in January.

Evidently they are worried about pitch control seeing as more than half (not all) the title are affected. Again, I fail to see the added advantage of gaining two minutes an hour short of squeezing in an extra couple spots for which I say drop a song instead.

You can’t be “soft and relaxing” while using the opposite approach. Brightness is the antithesis of laid back. Telling the listeners that it’s raining while peeing down their leg isn’t going to leave a lasting impression. “A truly SOFT AC station” doesn’t play uptempo Lady Gaga or a 6:32 rocking Hotel California or playing country versions of the AC hit. I heard at least a couple. One is “I Hope You Dance” by Lee Ann Womack with Sons of the Desert. That is the country album version. The other Is “This Kiss” by Faith Hill, again the country album mix. I Would think they want to sever ties with any hints of country at this point!

25-plus years around broadcasting and doing this format on and off through it and hundreds of weddings, these are only my observations and opinions and nothing more; your mileage may vary!

P.S. I age out of the demo in 4.5 years - woot!

Michael Rivers Kramer said:

I was the APD/MD of KGBY in the late 90's when we pitched up the music at 2%. I don't hear The Breeze pitched up at all when I listen on line and compare the same songs side by side with the music stored on my phone. I do not believe they pitch it up at all. Why would they since they aren't worried about tempo. This is truly a Soft AC station.

We pitched up the music on Y-92 + 2%, to make the station sound brighter than KYMX and K-108 before that. We promoted Y-92 as an upbeat, "Bright AC" with our Motto "Picks You Up and Makes You Feel Good" Our positioning.., "Paul and Phil in the Morning, Today's Hits and Yesterday's Favorites All Day, 92.5, Y-92!"

We had a rule when I programmed the music, not to play any ballads back to back. It was challenging to say the least, when 60 percent of the playlist at Mood level "1". Listeners said they liked the uptempo feel of, Y-92, but the highest testing songs were and are ballads. It's all about the passion.

I'm 54 and will age out of the 25-54 demo in January.

Click to expand...

DavidEduardo said:

The two now-ancient reasons for upping the pitch a bit are 1) to sound a bit brighter and 2) to make competitors sound draggy. it was never, in my experience, about fitting in more songs or more commercials.

Click to expand...

And it may be a mistake. I had a complaint that our stream was off-pitch from a musician who was trying to jam along with songs that were being played on the radio. Nobody here is intentionally changing anything, but I discovered that our stream generator PC software was sampling at 44.1 KHz while the soundcard defaulted to 48 KHz. There had to be some missing bits somewhere, but that was the effect. Setting the darkice sampling rate to 48 KHz made that listener happy. And I learned something.

Dave B.

DavidEduardo said:

The two now-ancient reasons for upping the pitch a bit are 1) to sound a bit brighter and 2) to make competitors sound draggy. it was never, in my experience, about fitting in more songs or more commercials.

Click to expand...

I "was raised" in the radio business that it was always about "the precious seconds" gained by pitching up. But we've all had different experiences. In 2018, it's just silly IMHO. Again, that's one opinion on the matter. I imagine the demos listening don't care other than "it just sounds different" than my Amazon music.

Mediaace said:

You can’t be “soft and relaxing” while using the opposite approach.

P.S. I age out of the demo in 4.5 years - woot!

Click to expand...

BINGO! Absolutely agree. Pitching up does no favors other than changing the characteristics of the original recording. If the recording was meant to be heard that way, the artist would've recorded it that way.

I've never understood the need or desire to pitch up music unless you're a DJ and you're trying to beat match songs - that's the only exception IMHO.

stewie said:

BINGO! Absolutely agree. Pitching up does no favors other than changing the characteristics of the original recording. If the recording was meant to be heard that way, the artist would've recorded it that way.

I've never understood the need or desire to pitch up music unless you're a DJ and you're trying to beat match songs - that's the only exception IMHO.

Click to expand...

As David explained, it's all psychoacoustics -- giving the listener the impression that the music is higher-energy that it is on the station up the dial. It worked well. I remember how much more exciting the 1967 hits sounded on WRKO than they did on WBZ when I was a 12-year-old listening in suburban Boston, and I was hooked on 'RKO from the minute it flipped to Top 40, even though I'd been a devoted WBZ fan (over WMEX) for a couple of years before then.