Radio formats rarely flip overnight, but Throwback 93.3 did exactly that. On April 23, 2020, in the middle of the first COVID-19 lockdowns, iHeartMedia pulled the plug on Wave 93.3's country format in West Palm Beach and replaced it, in a single day, with wall to wall old school hip hop and R&B, according to coverage of the launch.
A Launch Built for a Moment Nobody Could Leave the House For
The timing wasn't an accident. iHeartMedia's local market president framed the switch explicitly around the quarantine, telling press the station wanted to give the Palm Beaches "a bit of a release" while everyone was stuck at home. The station reportedly opened with a marathon run of roughly 10,000 songs played back to back from artists like Usher, 50 Cent and Kanye West, a statement of intent before settling into a regular schedule built around 80s, 90s and 2000s hip hop and R&B.
Joining a Frequency With Its Own Hip Hop Pedigree
Throwback 93.3 didn't have to build a hip hop audience in the Palm Beaches from scratch. The market already had WMBX, a longtime urban contemporary station on 102.3 FM with roots stretching back to 1980, giving the region a real appetite for the genre well before Throwback 93.3 signed on. Rather than introducing hip hop to South Florida radio, the station carved out a specifically nostalgic lane inside a market that already knew the music.
Part of a Bigger iHeart Playbook
The format is not unique to West Palm Beach. iHeartMedia runs a whole family of similarly branded throwback hip hop and R&B stations across its markets, from Austin's Vibe 93.3 to Columbus's Throwback 105.3 and Panama City's 99.3 The Beat, all built on the same premise: take a market's existing love of hip hop and R&B and give it a station devoted entirely to the classics rather than current chart hits.
Press Play
For a station born out of a strange, homebound spring and built to make old favorites feel new again, Throwback 93.3 is worth a spin on Radio Shuffle whenever a 90s or 2000s hip hop fix is in order.