IT'S ALL IN THE MIX FOR AMBITIOUS Y107.

Byline: Kimberly White

How do you define ``alternative'' rock?

For some, it's goth. For others, it's industrial or heavy metal.

But John Duncan, new program director at Y107 (107.1 FM), alternative is just a label for music from bands that haven't dominated the rock 'n' roll scene for years.

``It's not Boston, it's not Foreigner, it's not Led Zepplin. Those bands, and derivatives of those bands, have dominated most radio stations.

``So when `alternative' first started to develop as a format, it was very simply an alternative to that kind of music that really dominated the radio waves on rock radio stations throughout the country,'' Duncan said.

And now the alternative is becoming the mainstream as Generation X becomes more powerful.

To that end, Y107 has changed its format to cater more to the musical preferences of people ages 22-32. Rather than the new alternative rock touted by other radio stations, Y107 is now playing music from groups popular in the late '80s and early '90s such as the Cure, the Smiths, Oingo Boingo, U2 and Depeche Mode, to name a few.

``This is the type of music that they'd rather hear,'' Duncan said, and Y107 is now focused on a niche that was previously unfulfilled by L.A.'s other top alternative rock stations such as KROQ-FM (106.7), Star (98.7 FM) and Channel 103.1 which tend to target the 16-to-24 age group.

``KROQ has been around for over 20 years, closer to 30 ... so a lot of people know who they are,'' Duncan said. ``We're just a baby,'' he said.

Y107 wasn't doing very well in the ratings at the time Duncan took over as program director in mid-December, so he was specifically hired to ``freshen things up and try and find a way to increase the ratings.''

The station, which covers 90 percent of the Los Angeles metro market with antenna towers in Ventura, Arcadia and Fallbrook, now has an audience of about 750,000 listeners who tune in each week, according to recent Arbitron ratings.

``KROQ has about 1.1 million, so we're still substantially behind ... but we're hoping these new changes that we've just implemented will result in a larger listening base,'' Duncan said.

The changes at Y107 started about a month ago, Duncan said, and also include a complete replacement of all the on-air personalities.

``We took everybody off the air about a month ago, and we just played music with recorded stuff in between the records, and we hired an entire new air staff.''

The new morning show includes four new personalities and has been designed to be more of a balance between music- and personality-driven formats, Duncan said. He added that Y107 tries to play seven or eight songs per hour, whereas most radio stations don't play any music at all during the morning.

But the morning show also includes entertainment elements, ``information elements that you might need, there's some quick news, traffic and some weather,'' he said.

When he first took over as program director, Duncan assessed the radio market and found that Y107 wasn't much different from any of the other alternative radio stations.

After doing some further research, Duncan says he discovered that KROQ was covering the new alternative music but not the older alternative niche for people who grew up on KROQ during their teen years.

``People who grew up on KROQ listened to it when they were 16 or 17 and it was really cool, but now they're 25 or 26 or 27 and they miss a lot of the songs that KROQ played back then,'' Duncan said. ``But KROQ, by its definition, is a very current-based radio station.''

For now, the crew at Y107 is aiming at an audience that likes older alternative rock.

``It's a constant challenge to reflect the taste of the audience you're striving to serve, to grow with them, to help them grow,'' Duncan said. ``A big chunk of where people learn about new music is through radio, so you've got to turn them on to the right music, but you don't want to turn them on to the music they're not going to like.''