Aaron Axelsen, a longtime fixture on Bay Area airwaves as the music director and an on-air personality for Alt 105.3, was dropped from the station’s roster after 23 years on Thursday, April 2, as part of a wave of layoffs at the station amid the economic slump caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“What a blessing and thrill it was to share my ultimate passion in life with you — music — for over two decades” Axelsen, a native of Livermore, said in a statement posted on social media. “It was quite simply a dream come true to work at my hometown station, one that I grew up listening to as a young new waver in Livermore.”

Axelsen was one of the holdovers from the original Live 105, where he also worked as assistant program director. The Bay Area modern rock powerhouse station, born in 1986, switched over to the Alt brand in 2018, under the Entercom umbrella.

His small office at the station’s studio on Battery Street was crammed with artifacts of bands whose careers he helped launch: signed posters, rare albums and gold records by the likes of Coldplay, Arcade Fire, Radiohead, Oasis and the Strokes.

Love you Bay Area, thank for 23 amazing years together. Signing off… 🎤💔 pic.twitter.com/tWwId0cXey — aaron axelsen 🎧 (@AaronAxelsen) April 3, 2020

Outside of Alt 105.3, he hosted the weekly club night Popscene. Started on Aug. 31, 1995, the dance party had been held for the past 10 years at the Rickshaw Stop in Hayes Valley, recently closed as part of the coronavirus shutdown, after more than a decade at the now-defunct 330 Ritch St. club.

There he introduced acts like the Killers, Amy Winehouse, Sam Smith, the 1975 and Muse to the Bay Area well before they were discovered by the rest of the world. Axelsen, who worked as a teenager at Berkeley’s uber-hip Mod Lang Records, also helms the monthly Britpop night, Leisure, at Cat Club in San Francisco.

Here’s the guy that basically introed us to US radio. Our friend @AaronAxelsen was laid off from his job of 23 years at 105.3 due to COVID. It’s hitting close to home with friends and family. We owe him a debt of gratitude. Wish him + our extended family a speedy return to normal https://t.co/9rvyaTUfn5 — The Killers (@thekillers) April 4, 2020

Axelsen developed and hosted off-peak specialty radio shows, including “Soundcheck,” which featured local and breaking bands, and “Subsonic,” which promoted new electronic music.

He also helped curate the lineups for Alt 105.3’s signature live music events — BFD, which was held annually at Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View for years, and the holiday Not So Silent Night shows.

He had been hosting his radio show from his Oakland home during the coronavirus shelter-in-place order.

Entercom CEO David Field announced the layoffs in an email to employees on Thursday, April 2, as first reported by insideradio.com.

“I am deeply saddened that we need to make these painful moves at this time, but they are necessary under the circumstances,” Field said in the email. “We are doing everything in our power to minimize the number of layoffs through shared sacrifice across the organization, but we will still need to eliminate or furlough a significant number of positions.”

In addition to layoffs, the company plans to cut salaries by 10% to 20%. Field is reportedly taking a 30% salary reduction.

Entercom is one of several radio companies in the country to announce major layoffs, furloughs and other cuts in response to the pandemic. iHeartMedia, which also has a San Francisco office, recently began a 90-day furlough for jobs that have been deemed “nonessential.”

Axelsen said he will take some time to focus on his family, including toddler Max, until the COVID-19 pandemic passes. He then plans to return to running Popscene and Leisure and DJing.

“I’m so humbled and appreciative for the opportunity I had and beyond grateful that I was somehow able to turn this crazy dream into a reality,” he said. “And finally, it’s with a great sense of closure that I realize I’ve accomplished everything I possibly could and more during this venture, there were simply no more mountains left for me to climb here, and now onto the next chapter!”