Kevin Ryder, former longtime co-host of the “Kevin & Bean” morning show on KROQ, is joining rival Los Angeles radio station 95.5 KLOS, it was announced Tuesday.
Beginning Thursday, Ryder will co-host an afternoon show, “Kevin & Sluggo” with another former KROQ personality, Doug “Sluggo” Roberts. The show will air weekdays from 3 to 7 p.m.
“I’m happy KLOS has lowered their standards just enough for me to slip in,” Ryder said in a tongue-and-cheek announcement. “Everyone at the station, starting with Heidi and Frank in the morning, are having fun, and love the music they’re playing. I’m happy to be working in the afternoon, with my longtime friend Sluggo, because one of us needs to be able to use the English language sufficiently. Plus, I need my beauty sleep to remain at the top of the modeling game. I’m looking forward to reconnecting with listeners and having fun on the air in L.A. again!”
The “Kevin & Sluggo” show is described as “Maxim magazine meets Rolling Stone meets ESPN meets Comedy Central,” and will feature a mix of rock music, talk, comedy, listener interaction, and celebrity and artist interviews.
“Great talent and content are king,” said Keith Cunningham, KLOS program director. “If we’re not providing both, we’ll become irrelevant. Kevin is laugh-out-loud funny, an A-List content creator, hall of famer, this market loves him, and adding him to the team and partnering him with Sluggo completes what I consider to be the most powerful and entertaining on-air lineup in all of Southern California.”
Ryder lost his spot on KROQ last March, when station owner Entercom pulled the plug on “Kevin in the Morning with Allie & Jensen,” the successor program to “Kevin & Bean,” which he had co-hosted for 30 years until Gene “Bean” Baxter left the show in late 2019 and moved to London.
In addition to his KLOS gig, Ryder will continue a weekday show he launched last month with Mike Catherwood, “Great News! With Kevin & Mike,” as both a YouTube video and podcast.