Adam Carolla, the radio personality whose “Adam Carolla Show” program took the timeslot once held by Howard Stern on CBS Radio, has lost his job.
Update (Thursday, 2/19): CBS Radio has now officially confirmed all of the information reported here. KLSX will change to “AMP RADIO” this Friday, February 20, at 5 p.m. The new format is described as “playing all the hits.” Friday will mark the final broadcasts for Adam Carolla, Tom Leykis, and Frosty, Heidi, and Frank. Thus far, none of them has discussed their plans for the future.
Earlier in the week, multiple sources had corroborated reports that Carolla’s radio show had been cancelled and that Carolla had been let go. Some rumors correctly suggested his home station, Los Angeles’s 97.1 KLSX, was preparing to switch from its current talk format to a more top-40-style format. Other speculation correctly suggested the change would leave KLSX personality Tom Leykis out of a job as well.
As for the format shift, radio gossip site RadioInsight first discovered that the domains AmpRadioLA.com, Amp971.com, and Amp971fm.com were all registered anonymously on February 9. Additionally, AmpRadio971.com and 971AmpRadio.com were registered in the name of programming consultant Anthony Acampora about a month ago. (Amp Radio is evidently a youth-oriented format that’s been used in other markets.)
Carolla, interestingly, signed a “multiyear extension” for his “Adam Carolla Show” program at the end of 2007. A CBS Radio exec said at the time that the show had “far exceeded [CBS’s] expectations and proven to be a listener favorite,” even adding that he “anticipate[d] even more success for the program in the years to come.”
