Why Did 91X Fire Mookie?

Marc “Mookie” Kaczor was escorted out the doors at 91X when he was fired October 15. He’d been on the air there since 2002, when he segued from the Grossmont College radio program to the alternative-rock station. For the past two years, Mookie was on from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

“I was on the air seven days a week,” says Mookie about his recent work schedule, which included prerecorded air shifts. “I got to hang out by the Lafayette [Hotel] pool and listen to myself,” said the North Park resident in a telephone interview. He called his 91X stint a dream gig. “Just this month I got to see Arcade Fire, Gogol Bordello, and Muse.”

Mookie says his moderate paycheck could not have been the reason he was let go. And what makes his dismissal even more perplexing is that the last Arbitron book showed Mookie’s ratings were huge in his target demographic, second only to Rock 105.3 among men aged 18–34, topping 94/9, Z-90, and Channel 9-3-3.

“Everyone kept telling me my ratings were up. I poured my guts into this thing. Now I’m supposed to accept this as the nature of the business.”

Mookie says he was completely surprised when his boss, 91X program director Garrett Capone, told him he was out. Capone declined to comment on the termination. Mookie maintains that Capone is not connected to the locals who are devoted to 91X, which has been playing modern rock for 27 years.

Capone and nighttime DJ Christy Taylor came to 91X from a station in Albany. “The Albany cats don’t know what 91X used to be or what it means to locals,” says a radio insider.

Veteran DJ Robin Roth, who worked at 91X from 1986 until 1994, was hired to take over Mookie’s time slot. Roth has been spinning goth/industrial nights at Kava Lounge and the Flame and hosting club nights at Whistle Stop and Air Conditioned Lounge.