Most commercial radio stations exist to sell ads against a predictable playlist. The Colorado Sound exists for the opposite reason: a nonprofit built specifically to give new music, deep cuts and regional artists a place on the dial before anywhere else picks them up.
The frequency at 105.5 FM had a rougher past before it found that purpose. Licensed originally under the call sign KIMX in 1989, it cycled through a Jack FM format under NRC Broadcasting and later became an ESPN Denver sports station. Community Radio for Northern Colorado, the nonprofit behind public station KUNC, bought the frequency from Front Range Sports Network for three million dollars in December 2015 and flipped it, on February 29, 2016, into KJAC, 105.5 The Colorado Sound.
The launch lineup drew from Colorado radio veterans rather than outside hires. Ron Bostwick and Keefer Fulgham, both formerly of Boulder's KBCO, took mornings and afternoons, joined by Margot Chobanian from Atlanta's 92.9 Dave-FM and KUNC's own Benji on nights. That mattered for the station's Adult Album Alternative format, which leans on hosts who already know the Front Range scene rather than a syndicated feed deciding what counts as a deep cut.
As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, the station answers to listeners and donors instead of advertisers, which is also why it is moving. The Bohemian Foundation, established by Fort Collins philanthropist Pat Stryker, is building KUNC and KJAC a new home inside an expansion of the Armory, its downtown live music venue, complete with a shared bar and green room for touring acts playing next door. It is a fitting arrangement for a station whose entire mission is treating music discovery as a form of community building, not just background noise.
For anyone tired of algorithm-driven playlists, The Colorado Sound offers the alternative: real programmers, based in the region they broadcast to, choosing songs because they are worth hearing rather than because a chart says so.