The KROQ Top 106.7 Countdowns is an end-of-year countdown that lists the top "106.7" songs on the Los Angeles station KROQ as voted by listeners. The countdown started in 1980, and ran every year until 2009. [b] Since 2009, the list has been compiled by fans from playlist data. [1]
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, KROQ's proximity to Hollywood and the Los Angeles music scene gave it a unique place in the development of the punk, new wave and alternative rock genres. [2] In its heyday, KROQ was considered the most powerful radio station in the world. It was the top-rated station in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, and its "ROQ of the 80s" format was copied nationwide. [3] Its renegade roots, and willingness to experiment, came along at the same time as the birth of punk and new wave. The choices made by the station and its staff had a worldwide impact. This is reflected in the annual list of most popular songs. [3]
The end of year countdown was the first among the station's "lists". Among others released are the "List Of 106.7 Biggest KROQ Bands" [4] [5] and "Flashback 500" or "Firecracker 500" (presenting the 500 most popular songs). [4] In April 2020, the station released a COVID Quarantine edition of the "Top 106.7 Songs of All Time", with Everlong by the Foo Fighters topping the list. [6]
Over the years, bands like the Go-Gos and the Bangles made the list, but didn't make the top spot. Missing Persons, fronted by Dale Bozzio, topped the chart in 1981, the chart's second year. [a] [b] However, since its inception, the number of female artists has decreased over the years, [8] with Sinéad O'Connor being the only woman, or female act, to top the countdown. [a] [b] [9] This is the same phenomena seen on the Billboard's Alternative Songs chart that went seventeen years without a woman topping the chart from 1996 to 2013. [10]
Over the years, KROQ's Weenie Roast has also faced allegations that it does not pay enough attention to gender equity. [11]
The Empire Strikes First is the thirteenth studio album by American punk rock band Bad Religion, released on June 8, 2004. The album is heavily influenced by the then-current Iraq War and also has some nods to George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the latter most likely inspired by the Patriot Act.
KROQ Weenie Roast is a multi-artist music concert, presented annually in May by the Los Angeles, California, modern rock radio station KROQ-FM. Since its beginning in 1993, it has been traditionally held on a Saturday in May or June, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been no editions of the festival since 2019.
Modern rock is an umbrella term used to describe rock music that is found on college and commercial rock radio stations. Some radio stations use this term to distinguish themselves from classic rock, which is based in 1960s–1980s rock music.
The Woodentops are a British rock band that enjoyed critical acclaim and moderate popularity in the mid-1980s.
KYSR is a commercial radio station licensed to Los Angeles, California, and owned by iHeartMedia, Inc. KYSR broadcasts an alternative rock format and is the flagship station of syndicated morning drive time program The Woody Show. The KYSR studios are on West Olive Avenue in Burbank.
"Vow" is a song by alternative rock band Garbage. It was released as their debut single in early 1995 by Discordant, a label set up by Mushroom Records to launch the group, and Almo Sounds in North America.
"Nothing Compares 2 U" is a song written by the American musician Prince for his band The Family. It first appeared on their only album, The Family (1985). Its lyrics express the feelings of longing expressed by an abandoned lover.
Edwin Jed Fish Gould III, known to radio listeners as "Jed the Fish", is a disc jockey who hosted afternoon drive on KROQ-FM in Los Angeles, from 1978 to 2012. He interviewed alternative acts such as Brian Eno, David Bowie, Sting, and Elvis Costello. An early supporter of new wave and alternative bands, Jed the Fish is reputed to have been the first US DJ to play Depeche Mode, Duran Duran, and the Pretenders, helping KROQ establish itself as an influential radio station of the 1980s and 1990s.
James Trenton, nicknamed "the Poorman", is an American radio broadcaster. He is best known as the creator and host of Loveline on KROQ-FM in Los Angeles from 1983 to 1993. He currently hosts a morning radio program on KOCI 101.5 FM, a station located in south Orange County, California. "Poorman's Morning Rush" is also now in 4 markets. Three shows are taped daily M-F and KOCI is live five days a week.
"Violet" is a song by American alternative rock band Hole, written by vocalist and guitarist Courtney Love and guitarist Eric Erlandson. The song was written in mid-1991, and was performed live between 1991 and 1992 during Hole's earlier tours, eventually appearing as the opening track on the band's second studio album Live Through This (1994). The song was released as the group's seventh single and the third from that album in early 1995.
Mark Goodman is an American radio host, TV personality and actor. He is best known as one of the original five video jockeys (VJs), along with Nina Blackwood, Alan Hunter, J. J. Jackson and Martha Quinn, on the music network MTV, from 1981 to 1987.
"Evolution" is a song by American nu metal band Korn. The song was the first single to be released from the band's untitled album on June 12, 2007. It is one of the four tracks in which Brooks Wackerman of Bad Religion performed drumming duties.
"Institutionalized" is the debut single by American hardcore punk/crossover thrash band Suicidal Tendencies. It was released in 1983 as the only single from their self-titled debut album. "Institutionalized" is one of the band's most popular songs and has remained a live staple since it was first played in 1982. The song was re-recorded on the band's 1993 album Still Cyco After All These Years; this version was nominated for the Grammy for Best Metal Performance in 1994, but lost to Ozzy Osbourne's live version of "I Don't Want to Change the World".
Felony was an American new wave and rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, in the early 1970s by brothers Jeffrey Scott Spry, Joseph Anthony Spry, brothers Danny Sands and Steve Sands.
KROQ-FM is a commercial radio station licensed to Pasadena, California, serving the Greater Los Angeles. Owned by Audacy, Inc., it broadcasts an alternative rock format known as "The World Famous KROQ".
Kevin and Bean was the morning show on KROQ-FM, an alternative rock-format radio station in Los Angeles, California. It was hosted by Kevin Ryder and Gene "Bean" Baxter. The show was on the air from 1990 to 2019 and interspersed music and news with comedy, celebrity interviews, listener call-ins, and live music performances.
Adult album alternative is a radio format. Its roots trace to both the "classic album stations of the ’70s as well as the alternative rock format that developed in the ’80s."
Useless Keys are an American alternative rock band from Los Angeles, California composed of Michael Regilio and Michael Bauer.
"The Devil in Stitches" is a song written by Brett Gurewitz and performed by Bad Religion. It was the first single from their fifteenth studio album, The Dissent of Man, which was released on September 28, 2010.
"Hallelujah" is a song by American solo project Panic! at the Disco. It was released as a single on April 19, 2015 through Fueled by Ramen as the first single from their fifth studio album Death of a Bachelor. "Hallelujah" debuted at number 40 on the Billboard Hot 100 selling over 71,000 copies, becoming the band's second top-40 hit single and the first in nine years since "I Write Sins Not Tragedies" was released in 2006. It is the first single not to include drummer Spencer Smith and bassist Dallon Weekes, thus making "Hallelujah" Panic! at the Disco's first single as a solo project.
KROQ 1 of 1990