Jed the Fish, KROQ DJ whose taste in music helped shape the 1980s and ’90s, dies at 69

Jed the Fish, the longtime KROQ DJ who set the station up to be as influential as it was in the 1980s and ’90s, died Monday morning. He was 69.

Jed, whose given name was Edwin Jed Fish Gould III, died at home in Pasadena under hospice care, his close friends confirmed to The Times.

The cause of death was an especially aggressive form of lung cancer that was diagnosed in early March.

He had assumed in late January that the irritation he was experiencing was residual to the fire in Altadena, his longtime friend Rudy Koerner said in a phone interview. When other doctors couldn’t find a cause, Dr. Drew Pinsky, also a KROQ veteran, suggested that he get scanned in case it was something more serious, Koerner said.

Jed hosted the afternoon drive-time show on KROQ from 1978 to 2012, and his unique taste in music set the station up as an authority on punk and new wave in the 1980s and alt-rock in the 1990s. Jed influenced KROQ, the station influenced Los Angeles, L.A. influenced California and California influenced the taste of the nation, Koerner said.

This story is developing and will be updated.