City | San Luis Obispo, California |
---|---|
Broadcast area | San Luis Obispo County, California |
Frequency | 91.3 MHz |
Branding | Cal Poly Radio - 91.3 FM |
Programming | |
Format | Campus radio |
Ownership | |
Owner | California Polytechnic State University |
History | |
First air date | 1968 |
Call sign meaning | K Cal Poly Radio |
Technical information | |
Facility ID | 8324 |
Class | A |
ERP | 310 watts |
HAAT | 432 meters (1,417 ft) |
Transmitter coordinates | type:city 35°21′38.00″N120°39′21.00″W / 35.3605556°N 120.6558333°W |
Links | |
Webcast | Listen Live |
Website | kcpr.org |
KCPR (91.3 FM) is a non-commercial radio station that is licensed to San Luis Obispo, California. Owned by California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) in San Luis Obispo, the station is operated by students from its on-campus studio located in the Graphic Arts building. In addition to its FM broadcast, KCPR streams its programming online 24 hours a day and has established a growing social media audience.
KCPR is known for launching the careers of several entertainers and public figures, including musician "Weird Al" Yankovic, comedian Eric Schwartz, and news reporter David Kerley.
KCPR debuted in August 1968, making its first broadcast with a small two-watt transmitter. [1] According to station lore, the first words spoken on-air were, "Is this the damn switch?" [2] However, an archived version of KCPR's website from 2000 holds the station's first words to be, "How the hell do you turn this thing on?" [3]
Cal Poly professor and former KCPR disc jockey Jim Cushing describes the station's musical philosophy as "to provide people with a blend of music that they will not find on any other station, to remind people that the musical culture belongs to them". [4] Among the programs that have anchored the KCPR program schedule for years include The Breakfast Club, Afternoon Delight, The Comedown, The Lounge, and Club 91.
Musician Alfred "Weird Al" Yankovic served as a disc jockey at KCPR while attending Cal Poly in the late 1970s as an undergraduate architecture student. [5] He recorded his iconic parody song "My Bologna" on campus in the bathroom across the hall from the station's original location on the second floor of the Graphic Arts Building (Building 26). [4] [6] Yankovic returned to Cal Poly in the 1990s for an interview and recorded a station identification for KCPR. [7]
KCPR is branded as "Cal Poly Radio". Previously, it was known as "Burnt Dog Radio", an axiom that is reflected in one of the station's early logo designs that featured the RCA Victor dog. [8] A logo from the 1980s shows the RCA dog with its head blown off, next to a speaker, and a dog bowl labeled KCPR. Presumably, the loud music is what caused the RCA dog's head to explode, a visual representation of the alternative direction that KCPR took after abandoning its top 40 format in 1983. [9]
In the summer of 2008, KCPR moved to a new studio in the same building after 39 years of continuous operation. [4]
In 2017, Great Value Colleges, a consumer resource website for prospective university students, selected KCPR as one of its top 30 college radio stations in the United States. [10] [11]
Occasionally, KCPR hosts concerts at SLO Brew in downtown San Luis Obispo. Some notable artists have performed at these shows, including Jorja Smith and The Strokes. [12]
During the 2017–2018 academic year, KCPR began hosting Club 91 events at Underground Brewing Company in downtown San Luis Obispo. Club 91 features live music played by KCPR student DJs.
San Luis Obispo is a city and county seat of San Luis Obispo County, in the U.S. state of California. Located on the Central Coast of California, San Luis Obispo is roughly halfway between the Bay Area in the north and Greater Los Angeles in the south. The population was 47,063 at the 2020 census.
California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo is a public university in San Luis Obispo, California. It is one of three polytechnics in the California State University system.
Cal Poly is an abbreviation for California Polytechnic and may refer to:
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona is a public polytechnic university in Pomona, California. It is one of three polytechnic universities in the California State University system.
"My Bologna" is a parody of the Knack's hit song "My Sharona", recorded and performed by musical parody artist "Weird Al" Yankovic. Yankovic originally wrote the song while he attended California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, California; the original version of the parody was recorded in a bathroom across the hall from the radio station at which Yankovic worked. The title refers to Bologna sausage, specifically the Oscar Mayer brand popular in the United States. Yankovic sent "My Bologna" to Dr. Demento, who aired the song on his nationwide radio program, The Dr. Demento Show. The song was a hit on the program, and eventually gained the number one spot on Dr. Demento's "Funny Five" countdown.
Bubblegum Alley is a tourist attraction in downtown San Luis Obispo, California, known for its accumulation of used bubble gum on the walls of an alley. It is a 15-foot (4.6 m) high and 70-foot (21 m) long alley lined with chewed gum left by passers-by. It covers a stretch of 20 meters in the 700 block of Higuera Street in downtown San Luis Obispo.
The Palm Theatre, located at 817 Palm, San Luis Obispo, California, is an independently owned and operated movie theatre which showcases a variety of independent, foreign, arthouse, and mainstream cinema. The Palm Theatre was the first movie theatre in the United States to be run by solar energy.
Paul David Kerley III, known professionally as David Kerley, is an American journalist who is a correspondent for ABC News in Washington, D.C.
The Cal Poly Mustangs are the athletic teams representing California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, California. The university fields twenty-one teams and compete in NCAA Division I; they are primarily members of the Big West Conference, but the football team plays in the Big Sky Conference, the wrestling team is an associate member of the Pac-12 Conference, and the swimming and diving program competes as an affiliate member in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation.
The 1952 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic State University during the 1952 college football season. Cal Poly competed in the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA).
The 1946 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1946 college football season.
The 1970 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic State University during the 1970 NCAA College Division football season.
The 1927 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1927 college football season.
The 1926 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1926 college football season.
The 1925 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1925 college football season.
The 1924 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1924 college football season.
The 1923 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1923 college football season.
The 1922 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic School during the 1922 college football season.
The 2003 Cal Poly Mustangs football team represented California Polytechnic State University during the 2003 NCAA Division I-AA football season.