KMVA

KMVA (Hot 97.5/103.9 FM) is an Adult Top 40 radio station in the Phoenix, Arizona, area. The station is licensed to Dewey-Humboldt and is owned by Riviera Broadcasting, LLC.

History

For many years, KMVA operated as KVNA-FM, an Adult Contemporary-formatted radio station based in Flagstaff. Marathon Media, a company known for taking rural stations and moving them closer to larger metropolitan areas in order to sell them for a larger amount, purchased the station in 2003, and got approval to move the station to a site between Phoenix and Prescott to cover the Phoenix metropolitan area.

It first signed on at the new site in April 2005 as KZLB, calling itself "97.5 Latino Beat," featuring a mix of Spanish-language pop and Reggaeton. The station was in the middle of being sold at the time. KVIB 95.1, a station broadcasting from the same location with an identical format, signed on the air just one month later, thus forcing KZLB off the air for three months. 97.5 returned to the airwaves in late August with a format that consisted of a mix of classic and more recently recorded Pop Standards and Swing music, known on-air as "Star 97.5" with the KRZS calls. KRZS flipped to Rhythmic AC as "Movin' 97.5" at 5PM on October 27, 2006. The last song on Star 97.5 was You Make Me Feel So Young by Frank Sinatra, while the first song on Movin' 97.5 was Bust a Move by Young MC. The station's old website was still up, but left a goodbye message to its listeners as to why they made the decision to switch formats and hopes that they can find a new place for its displaced one. Throughout 2009, the station began adding various top 40 pop and rock songs, moving more into a Hot AC direction but keeping some of the rhythmic material. During this period, the station aired On Air With Ryan Seacrest.