Finest City Broad-Cutting? The 25th anniversary of 91X (on January 11) was ignored by everyone, including station management at Finest City Broadcasting.

"For the tenth anniversary, they had the 'X years of the X' promotion," says a former employee. "They had birthday promotions, special music shows, and interviews. They did the same thing with '20 years of the X.' "

Phil Manning, 91X's program director for a year, executed the decision to ignore the anniversary. He did not respond to a request for comment. Manning shouldn't be blamed for wrongdoing, says a local music veteran who believes the station can't afford to look old.

"That station wants to target the 18- to 30-year-olds; with them, nobody cares about the old 91X."

When the station broke off from Clear Channel and "relaunched" in 2005, 91X brought back many of the former DJs. Most of those DJs have since left 91X and - except for a Sunday-morning retro show - the station largely ignores '80s artists such as the Clash, the Cure, and the Smiths, bands that established the station's popularity.

The December firings of DJ Stephen Kallao and 11-year morning-show anchor Chris Cantore was another Manning decision. Arbitron ratings for the last three months of 2007 indicate that the time slots for both DJs showed significant improvement: among listeners 18-34, Cantore was top five among English-speaking stations (this was the second consecutive rating period for which he was in the top five); Kallao's time slot was number four. These were the best showings for 91X in over three years.

- Ken Leighton

New Boss Future band performances were canceled at Scolari's Office two weeks ago.

"The vice department shut us down," says owner George Scolari, whose bar opened in 1981. "They canceled our entertainment license. They said we didn't pay them [for a license renewal fee], but I have the canceled check."

SDPD Sgt. Howard Labore says no vice crackdown ever occurred. He says the revocation of Scolari's entertainment permit has to do with a pending ownership change.

"We did not take any action against them," says Labore. "They are selling the business, and the new owner chose not to renew.... The escrow should close in the next 50 to 60 days."

Ted Lithopoulos, majority owner of Bar Dynamite in Mission Hills, will likely soon own Scolari's Office. After two months of renovation, which he says will begin as soon as escrow closes, Lithopoulos will reopen Scolari's "immediately" with a new entertainment license, but he says he has yet to decide what the entertainment format will be.

"I am not at that point yet [to make an announcement]," says Lithopoulos, but music may come from DJs, live bands, or a combination of both.

While the bar goes without music, one person close to Scolari's says, "This might help the Zombie Lounge [and] Chasers."

In June 2006, Scolari made a move to sell his bar; undisclosed complications held up the sale. In September 2006, live music shows were halted; an employee blamed it on a lapsed entertainment license, and music resumed a few weeks later. The North Park bar has hosted local and touring bands since 2001.

- Ken Leighton

Baby Killer "San Diego City Beat has shitcanned the Locals Only [music] column," blogs Scott Pactor at CatDirtSez. "Word on the street is that whatever replaces Locals Only is going to be helmed by Kinsee Morlan, who lives in Tijuana, not San Diego."

Rosey Bystrak, who has written "Locals Only" since September 2007, blogs, "The column had been cut a couple times in the last few weeks.... I received an e-mail from Nathan Dinsdale, the music editor, who informed me that the editorial staff had come to a consensus about the direction of the column. The column will take a new shape, into something more inclusive, and will be the work of several contributors, to make better use of the space."

An email from City Beat editor Dave Rolland is quoted at sddialedin.com, reading in part, "We've begun to tire of the Locals format. Over the last couple of years, it's come to feel a little too much like public relations for local bands, and we'd like to make better use of the space. Sometimes you have to kill your babies and try something new to keep things fresh."

- Jay Allen Sanford

Safe and Saucy "If you're going to a show and know that you'll be having a drink or two, we'll be your sober ride home," says Adam Lindstaedt, cofounder of Concert Cabs.

"We [will] offer free rides home to patrons attending concerts throughout San Diego County. For a fee, we'll also pick you up before the show and drop you off at the front door of the venue....

"People are driving home drunk," he says of the project's genesis. "Practically all the venues in San Diego are not serviceable by the trolley, aside from the Casbah, House of Blues, and 4th&B. Buses stop running before shows end, and cab rides get way too expensive...a cab downtown from the Belly Up costs over $50 before tip!

"The vehicles we use will be rented," says the 23-year-old SDSU graduate with a degree in management. "If we owned the cars, we would have an unimaginably difficult insurance policy.... To make the vehicles recognizable to patrons, we'll use [magnets] attached to the vehicle's exterior....

"Since we are a nonprofit organization...we don't need a taxi license to operate our service.... We will be able to solicit donations from the community, local businesses, and individuals, or any other party looking to contribute. Until that point, we'll be using our own hard-earned money to get the business off the ground.... We aim to give our first free ride home by the end of January or early February."

The rides are only to people's homes.

"We are not a drunk bus that will cart you around from club to club," says Lindstaedt, though he adds, "to receive a ride home, patrons do not necessarily need to be intoxicated."

Riders are required to sign a liability waiver, and they're not allowed to smoke or drink alcohol in the vehicle. myspace.com/concertcabs

- Jay Allen Sanford

Good Times Start and End Guitarist John Stewart played in the Kingston Trio from 1961 to '67. The trio helped launch the American folk craze that preceded the British Invasion.

"He was visiting my Uncle Nick [Reynolds, cofounder of the Kingston Trio] for dinner," recalls guitarist Joey Harris of Stewart's January 17 visit to Reynolds's Coronado home. "He was feeling a little headachy, so he went back with [wife] Buffy to their room at the Hotel del Coronado."

"Buffy called me at two in the morning," says Greg Jorgenson, a longtime friend of Stewart. "She told me John had trouble talking. She had already called the ambulance."

Following a massive stroke or brain aneurysm, Stewart died at Scripps Mercy Hospital in Hillcrest on January 20. "It was the same hospital he was born in [in 1939]," says Jorgenson.

After the Kingston Trio, Stewart went on to record 45 albums, including 1969's California Bloodlines, which was named number 36 of the Top 200 albums of all time by Rolling Stone. Stewart wrote "Daydream Believer" for the Monkees around the time he left the Kingston Trio.

"I joined John's backup band in 1975, right after I got out of [Coronado] high school," says Harris, who played with the Beat Farmers for 11 years. "I was with him until 1979, when Lindsey Buckingham convinced him to pick up an electric guitar. We agreed I should leave the band."

Both Jorgenson and Harris say that Stewart had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease last summer. "Hardly anyone knew about it," says Jorgenson. "Unless you really, really knew him, you couldn't tell he had it."

Jorgenson says Stewart lived in San Diego before moving to Pasadena at a young age. He says Lindsey Buckingham recently performed on four songs for Stewart's new album, recorded at Jorgenson's Pasadena-area studio. He says Stewart's wife now owns the masters to the unnamed album, which is planned for a springtime release.

"It's kind of a car-themed album," says Jorgenson. "One of the songs is 'I Will Never Drive Again,' which addresses the Alzheimer's situation. Once you're diagnosed, you can't drive."

- Ken Leighton

Stormy Weather... Smooth jazz guitarist Patrick Yandall releases his tenth album, Laws of Groovity, in April, but two of the tunes, "Viejo Amigo" and "Gaviotas," are already getting airplay, albeit in a less-than-obvious location: the Weather Channel (founded in 1982 by another San Diegan - KUSI weatherman John Coleman).

The station has played Yandall's music as background for three years.

"I submitted some songs to a licensing firm in L.A., and they immediately asked if they could resubmit them to the Weather Channel," explains Yandall. He's been a mainstay of the station ever since. "The company told me my music had become an example of what they liked."

The Weather Channel has attracted a hard-core group of music fans who have posted screenshots of weather reports, featuring Yandall's music, on YouTube. The station took notice of the interest in its soundtrack and in October of last year released a music compilation (though no Yandall compositions are included).

"Royalties are royalties," comments Yandall about his music being used as aural wallpaper. "It allows me to do projects and not have to work a day gig, other than producing and practicing music."

Yandall acknowledges the Weather Channel is an unusual place for his music to find a home, but it's not the strangest place he's come across it.

"One time I was in a bathroom at a casino and I heard one of my tunes. Weird feeling, but it means royalties."

- Bart Mendoza