By FishbowlLA Staff
Two weeks, one issue. Last Friday’s edition was held because nothing in Los Angeles media could be pinned to the week with confidence, so this one covers the fortnight. It was not a loud stretch for local newsrooms, but three small, telling things happened in the last few days of it: KABC’s local news went somewhere you would not expect to find a TV station, a bilingual FM experiment finally put a person in its morning chair, and the L.A. Press Club started filling out its December gala with a KCRW voice.
ABC7 is now an audio stream, too
TuneIn, the streaming-audio platform, has signed a deal with ABC Owned Television Stations that puts eight free, ad-supported channels from the group — local news, weather and Localish programming — onto its service. KABC (Channel 7) in Los Angeles is on the list, alongside WABC New York, WLS Chicago, WPVI Philadelphia, KGO San Francisco, KTRK Houston, WTVD Raleigh-Durham and KFSN Fresno. TuneIn says the channels reach listeners across more than 200 connected devices and vehicle integrations; it claims more than 75 million monthly active users in 122 countries and is owned by Stingray. TuneIn CEO Richard Stern’s pitch: the stations give listeners “easy access to what’s happening in their communities wherever they are.”
The interesting part, in this market, is the company KABC will keep on the dial. TuneIn already carries live AM and FM simulcasts from iHeart, Audacy and Cumulus — which in Los Angeles means a TV station’s newscast now sits one tap away from the radio news and talk stations it has competed with for decades, inside the dashboard of a car stuck on the 405. Whether anyone actually listens to a television newscast is the open question; the distribution, at least, is now there.
Reyna 103.1 gets its first daypart — and a familiar L.A. voice
This column covered Entravision’s launch of “Reyna 103.1” — KDLD Santa Monica and KDLE Newport Beach, a roughly 80/20 Spanish-English Hot AC built as a creator-led platform for Latinas — back in August. It now has a morning show. “La Tiendita Mornings with Melissa Rios” runs 6–10am, which RadioInsight notes is the station’s first set daypart; Rios is also its first regular on-air personality, joining five “Reynas” who produce short-form content. On Tuesdays and Thursdays she’ll broadcast from the “ReynaLona Bronco,” out in the community.
Rios is a pure L.A.-radio résumé: promotions at SBS Los Angeles, on-air as “Popis” at 97.9 La Raza KLAX, mornings co-host at Mega 96.3 KXOL from 2016 to 2019, part of Nick Cannon’s morning show on Power 106 KPWR from 2019 to 2021, and most recently afternoons at Meruelo Media’s Cali 93.9 KLLI until that station’s July flip. The tell is the hire itself: a format that launched pitching “digital capsules, podcasts, and social extensions” has concluded it still needs a human being with local credibility at 7am.
The Press Club’s December gala starts taking shape — with KCRW’s Madeleine Brand
The Los Angeles Press Club announced on Tuesday that singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile will receive its Visionary Award for Humanitarian Work at the National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards Gala, on Dec. 6 at the Millennium Biltmore downtown. The honoree who matters more to this column is the other one named so far: KCRW host Madeleine Brand, who receives the club’s Luminary Award for Career Achievement in Media. More honorees are expected.
Club president Danny Bakewell Jr. kept his remarks to Carlile — “Her work is amazing and, during these troubling times, desperately needed” — but for anyone who follows L.A. media, the career-achievement nod to a working local public-radio host is the headline.
That’s the week
Make that the fortnight — and a quiet one. The big national media stories of the past two weeks (Netflix’s job cuts and content-chief change, Fox’s shareholder vote on Roku) came without a Los Angeles angle we could source, so they aren’t here; the Los Angeles Times newsroom stayed out of the news again. Hearing something on the lots, in a newsroom or at a station? FishbowlLA wants the tip.