A controllable equalizer is arranged to be automatically and selectively disabled and is configured to operate in a frequency modulated (FM) radio receiver. The controllable equalizer includes an equalizer (115) that is configured to perform an equalization algorithm, e.g., CMA, that relies on a predetermined distribution for a received signal, where the received signal is available from the FM radio receiver and a spurious signal detector (123) that is configured to determine whether a spurious signal is present in the received signal and to disable the equalizer when the spurious signal is present. A method (300) of automatically and selectively disabling an equalizer operating in a frequency modulated (FM) radio receiver includes performing an equalization algorithm (307) on an FM received signal, the equalization algorithm relying on a predetermined distribution of the FM received signal, determining whether a spurious signal is present (309) in the FM received signal; and disabling the equalizer (317) when the spurious signal is present in the FM received signal.