KREV (FM)

As KJAZ from August 1, 1959, to July 31, 1994, the station aired a jazz format. Founded by Pat Henry, KJAZ prided itself on broadcasting only jazz music, and a 1965 station brochure proclaimed KJAZ "northern California's first and only fulltime jazz station".

In 1994, KJAZ was sold after owner Ron Cowan, in a financial crisis, deemed the station unprofitable. Since the demise of the jazz format, some KJAZ programmers and announcers have made their way to KCSM.

Since then, the KJAZ call sign has been used by various FM radio stations around the country, and is currently the call sign for a silent station in Point Comfort, Texas owned by Fort Bend Broadcasting of Austin, Texas.

Though listeners mounted a fundraising effort to keep KJAZ on the air (by some reports raising $1.5 million), the station was sold in 1994, and on July 31, KJAZ was converted to "La Z" a Spanish music station, the first of many different format changes the station would go through in the mid-late 1990s. From 1999 to 2002, it simulcast the rock format of KSJO in San Jose as KXJO.

On May 26, 2002, the 92.7 frequency's history as a dance music outlet would begin as KPTI, "92.7 PARTY," which was launched under former owner Spanish Broadcasting System. Nearly two years later, on March 17, 2004, it was sold to new owners, who flipped the format to mainstream urban as KBTB, "Power 92.7, The Beat of the Bay." Power 92.7 debuted on April 15, 2004 with 48 straight hours of songs by Tupac Shakur, a rapper from Oakland.[2] After it failed to attract an audience, along with controversy from rival KMEL (which made headlines in the press) and on top of that, seeing the sale falling apart, the station was put up for sale again.

KBTB was acquired by Flying Bear Media, backed by Alta Communications and Tailwind Capital. CEO Joe Bayliss flipped the station back to dance music on October 2, 2004 as Energy 92.7.[3] The station kept the KBTB call letters for several months before changing to KNGY, and kept the slogan The Beat of the Bay for over a year, but changed it to Pure Dance in 2006.

On July 17, 2005, KNGY moved its signal from its old tower on Russian Hill to the Sutro Tower, improving coverage in the South Bay, but later changed back to their old site due to signal issues. The effect was clear to South Bay listeners, who received a split signal between KNGY and KTOM, a country-format station from the Salinas area. In areas around the North Bay where line-of-site propagation is weak, listeners received a split signal between KNGY and KZSQ, a hot AC station from the Sonora, California area. Energy 92.7 was also heard on Comcast Digital Cable throughout the Bay Area on digital cable channel 964 and live online through the station's website.

KNGY was a reporter in Billboard Magazine's Dance/Mix Show Airplay panel and was the most-listened-to dance/electronic radio station on the West Coast. KNGY as "Energy 92.7" offered a current-based mix of dance music, with Top 40, R&B remixes, disco and club classics from the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s added into the presentation. It also broadcast sophisticated and mood-enhanced tracks including down-tempo groove, future jazz, electronic rock and chillout beats.

Under Bayliss, KNGY quickly built a reputation as "The Gay Station"—San Francisco's first commercial radio station that appealed openly to the Bay Area's large and highly influential gay community,[4] with a number of on-air DJs—and even a sportscaster—who were openly gay. The station also became heavily involved in numerous gay-community events, including San Francisco's annual Gay Pride Parade in June. In fact, after Energy's demise in 2009, the station's morning show "Fernando and Greg in the Morning", which was widely popular with fans, was moved over to KMVQ.

In December 2005, former KLLC program director John Peake was hired as Energy's new program director, filling the vacancy left by Chris Shebel. Prior to coming to San Francisco pre-KLLC, Peake was the PD of influential Top 40 KRBE/Houston, Texas, a station that was also known for adding dance cuts into their traditional playlist. In July 2008, Peake resigned from the PD job, which would be quickly filled by Don Parker, who, like Peake, also has credentials in programming dance-leaning stations as he was the PD of Rhythmic contemporary outlet KKFR/Phoenix during its dance-intensive days in the late 1980s and mid-1990s.

On weekends, KNGY aired a show called "Ghetto House Radio" which aired every Saturday at midnight. The program featured a house/dance music mix with a mix of rap and "ghetto" music until 2 a.m. Sunday morning, when Trevor Simpson's world town mix airs.

In February 2009, KNGY added former KGO talk show host Karel to their lineup. His program aired from 9 p.m. to midnight Monday through Thursdays and it was the only time that the station did not play any music. However, after five months, Karel's program was dropped from the lineup in June 2009.[5]

In July 2009, Flying Bear announced that KNGY was sold to Ed Stolz's Royce International Broadcasting for $6.5 million. AllAccess reported that the station will become a CHR-format station with the new callsign KREV.[6] According to a published report,[7] Flying Bear was forced to sell the station after it was unable to renegotiate the terms of a $6 million loan held by a subsidiary of Wells Fargo Bank.

In September 2009, KNGY's on-air and production staff were given notice that they were being laid off, and PD Don Parker gave a short farewell to listeners on the afternoon of September 10. Energy's final song was "Walk Away" by Kelly Clarkson.[8] At 9:08 pm (PDT) that day, after a few false starts, KNGY's format was changed to Top 40 as "92.7 REV FM".[9][10] The first song on "REV FM" was P!nk's "Get This Party Started." The flip to Top 40 marks KREV's entry into an already interesting CHR race in the San Francisco Bay Area, where it will have to compete for listeners with CBS Radio's Mainstream Top 40 KMVQ, iHeartMedia's Top 40 powerhouse KYLD and their Urban CHR sister KMEL both of whom have more signal coverage than KREV. KREV's playlist, station imaging and web site are essentially identical to that of KFRH in Las Vegas, which is also KREV's sister station. On October 12, 2009, the once-controversial morning show The Dog House returned to the Bay Area airwaves on KREV.

To fill the hole left open by the flip of KNGY, KMVQ flipped their HD-2 sub-channel to dance as "Pulse Radio" in 2010.

In 2018, ASCAP sued Royce International for non payment, which resulted in KREV being transferred into a court-ordered receivership controlled by broker Larry Patrick on July 6, 2020, along with two other CHR stations mentioned in the lawsuit, KFRH in Las Vegas, and KRCK-FM in the Coachella Valley.[11] One condition of the orders was that the stations eventually be sold.

On December 30, 2020, it was announced that VCY America will acquire the three stations.[12] Upon the closure of the acquisition, KREV will switch to VCY America's religious programming, and become the Milwaukee-based network's largest station by market area.