HarD Rock 96-5 HD2 KHMX appears to have gone off the Houston radio airwaves this week.
Not only is it off the air, but the entire sub-channel is currently not transmitting at all.
I contacted owner Audacy's corporate PR team for more info, but never heard back.
Are we all having flashbacks to 101 KLOL going off the air right about now?
The station sorta lives online. At least its branding does for now, but when you click play, you get Audacy's Venom format which is similar to HarD Rock 96-5 in the active rock format. By the way, this was Houston's only active rock formatted station.
It could be said my blog was brought to you by HarD Rock 96-5 HD2 since I was listening to the digital station most of the time while writing these posts. Will the lack of active rock on the radio in Houston do this blog in?
"Gen X, Xennials and many rock consuming Gen Y members of the Houston radio audience were not being served, so we built a rock radio station just for them," KHMX program director Chase Murphy told mikemcguff.com in 2017 when the station debuted.
Back then, Murphy described HarD Rock 96-5 HD2 as the only station in Houston to play Metallica to the Red Hot Chili Peppers to the Deftones to Pearl Jam to AC/DC and then Avenged Sevenfold. And it seemed to keep this type of format till the very end.
Loyal listeners will also remember the same music trivia spots that ran in addition to the songs. Hey, at least there were never commercials! At the same time, that last fact is probably what did the station in.
I believe "The Wave" smooth jazz station was on 96.5 HD3 which is also now gone. Longtime Houston radio listeners will remember "The Wave" from when it was on 95.7 until 2008 when Hot 95.7 took over, long before "The Spot. "
