Best Country Radio Station

As country music's popularity and sales continue to fall from its mid-'90s high point, the blame can be laid squarely at the doorstep of radio programmers who continue to promote hopelessly manufactured-sounding pap and try to pawn it off as country gold. Not so with KXKQ, which is based in Safford in eastern Arizona but broadcasts in the Valley. Though the station does mix in a fair selection of new country acts, the real attraction of its playlist is its adherence to old-school masters like Merle Haggard and George Jones. Besides offering up the big names from yesteryear, KXKQ plays its fair share of lost classics, hard-core honky-tonk and gen-u-wine tales about cheatin', drinkin', and truckin' that you won't find on an other frequency in town. Yee-haw!