Radio News

Dallas radio station 97.1 FM dumps talk format, to return to rock 'n' roll

Mike Rhyner was let go.

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Dallas radio station 97.1 FM has ended its brief excursion into talk radio and will return to rock: According to radio writer Richie Whitt, station owner iHeartMedia is pulling the plug on 97.1 The Freak, a talk show format it debuted in October 2022 that was lagging badly in ratings.

The company called a meeting on April 26 and fired the staff, including radio veterans Mike Rhyner, Jeff Cavanaugh, Danny Balis, and Ben & Skin.

Rhyner confirmed he'd been let go with a droll tweet that said "and another thing - now we’re not gonna see the end of the big office re-do."

He told the Observer that the station will revert back to its rock music programming as 97.1 The Eagle beginning on Monday, April 29.

On Friday afternoon, The Freak was airing replays of past shows. On April 29, the station began airing a noisy, chaotic pastiche of songs by rock bands like Pearl Jam, System of a Down, and Linkin Park, and a post on the website says "Landing Monday at 10 am!"

In 2022, the station made a change from music to talk radio, with a big fanfare that included the comeback of Rhyner, a big name in radio who came out of retirement to host a weekday afternoon show with Mike Sirois.

Other programming included a morning show with Jeff Cavanaugh; the Ben and Skin Show, an afternoon show with Ben Rogers and Jeff “Skin” Wade; a show called Cash In hosted by Jason Page; and a show called Just Sain' It hosted by Cole Thompson.

But the Freak's ratings lagged far behind the competition, 1310 The Ticket and 105.3 The Fan. The talk format also required an outlay on salaries to multiple hosts on more than one show.

In a Facebook post, Ben and Skin said, "We are heartbroken that the station that we worked so hard to help build is changing directions. We loved being a part of The Freak. The best part of the last 18 months was coming to work everyday with some of our closest friends and favorite DFW radio personalities. Nothing will top that. Although it was short-lived, it was far and away the most fun we've ever had in radio. We'll let you know the future of The Ben and Skin Show as soon as we can."

Rhyner said the demise was not a surprise, and attributed it to the fact that iHeart Radio stations are mostly music and not talk.

"We’ve all known we were dead men walking for a long time," he said.

Ratings for the first quarter of 2024 from January-March reveal the station's poor showing:

Mornings:

Ticket 12.8 (1)
Fan 9.2 (2)
Freak 1.9 (17)

Middays:

Fan 7.2 (1)
Ticket 6.9 (3)
Freak 2.0 (18)

Afternoons

Ticket 11.3 (1)
Fan 7.8 (2)
Freak 2.2 (17)

iHeart Media has not announced its plans, including what the change in format will mean to its relationship with the Dallas Mavericks. 97.1 FM has been the official station for Dallas Mavericks games for three years, with two years left on a five-year contract to air Mavericks games.

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All Eyes on Them

Dallas alt hip-hop group wins prestigious Tiny Desk Contest by NPR

Cure for Paranoia/Facebook

As winners of the Tiny Desk Contest, Cure for Paranoia will record their own Tiny Desk concert and go on tour.

Few live recording studios or musical web series have the cultural sway of NPR's Tiny Desk, and a Dallas band is poised to make an impactful debut: Cure For Paranoia, an alternative hip-hop project by rapper Cameron McCloud and producers Tomahawk Jonez and Jay Analo, has won the high-stakes annual Tiny Desk Contest for 2026.

They'll record their official Tiny Desk show "soon," the announcement by NPR says.

Winning the concert also means Cure for Paranoia is going on tour. The only Texas stop will be at Emo's Austin on June 24.

Tiny Desk is known for platforming both niche and majorly successful artists — NPR posted a new Foo Fighters set on YouTube on May 13 — for stripped-down sets that are literally played behind former All Things Considered director Bob Boilen's old desk. (Fun fact for Texans: Tiny Desk was created because folk artist Laura Gibson was disappointed with the sound at her South by Southwest show in Austin in 2008, and she wanted a redo.)

Most artists who appear on Tiny Desk more than 15 years later are already well-known, at least in their specific circles. But the Tiny Desk Contest, which launched in 2015, helps a growing group of newer, unsigned artists get their foot in the door. Contestants record one video of them performing a single song behind a desk, and a jury of radio staff and musicians chooses their favorite.

In their audition video, Cure for Paranoia gathered 11 musicians around a truly tiny desk and in front of downtown Dallas' iconic gigantic eyeball sculpture. They played the song "No Brainer," a frenetic track that starts with clever boasts and becomes a criticism of racism in the United States.

McCloud, a pre-school teacher, is known independently of Cure for Paranoia for rapping to his social media following about politics and current events. Some of those lyrics made it into "No Brainer." He says he started the group because he found that music was more helpful than medication for coping with bipolar depression and paranoid schizophrenia.

Alex Marrero, host of the Austin-based KUTX show Horizontes, was one of the judges this year. He was impressed with the visuals in Cure for Paranoia's audition.

“When this popped up, I immediately felt something different," he wrote in a blurb for the announcement. "It just jumped out. The visuals were super cool and creative, BUT I could still totally envision them bringing the heat behind the Desk.”

Madison McFerrin, jazz vocalist and daughter of the famous singer Bobby McFerrin, was one of the musical judges.

"Cure For Paranoia’s energy is infectious, fresh and distinctly theirs — exactly what you want in a Contest winner!" she wrote.

McCloud's post on Instagram announcing the group's win has only been up for three hours at the time of this article's publication, and it already has more than 8,000 likes. The YouTube audition has garnered 74,000 views.

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