During which pop eras did KRBE attract younger listeners?

Absolutely, you're right on target-KRBE really nailed it with younger audiences during the big pop boom of the late '90s and early 2000s, when teen pop like Britney Spears, *NSYNC, and Backstreet Boys ruled the airwaves. That was prime time for them to hook in the high school and college crowd who were all about TRL and Top 40. Then they did it again in the early 2010s, riding the wave of electronic pop and artists like Katy Perry, Rihanna, and Justin Bieber, which kept those younger demos locked in during that whole dance-pop resurgence.

Younger demos really gravitated to KRBE during the late '90s teen-pop explosion when Britney and *NSYNC were unavoidable, but the real shift happened in the early 2010s when they leaned hard into the EDM-infused pop and dance-pop crossover. That era's sound-think Calvin Harris, Rihanna's "We Found Love," and Lady Gaga's early stuff-felt fresh and club-ready, which is exactly what you need to pull in college students and young professionals looking for energy, not just ballads.

The late 1980s into the early 1990s saw KRBE pull in younger audiences with the rise of New Jack Swing and dance-pop from acts like Janet Jackson and Paula Abdul. That mix of R&B and upbeat pop felt more urban and fresh compared to the hair metal dominating other Houston stations at the time.

You're asking the wrong question. The real pull happened when they tapped into the dance-pop explosion of the mid-2000s-think Rihanna's "Pon de Replay" and Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl"-a time when Top 40 felt rebellious and radio was the only game in town for club-ready hooks. That era's energy hooked teens who wanted something less polished than the boy-band years and more immediate than the synth-pop revival.