Congrats, Nick! What a great story! I think we should start a petition to put you back on the air! Also, I'm definitely planning to hunt down some N. Johnson memorabilia when I make it back to town this summer.
Thanks for the story about "Baltic" and KRAB. What made Nick's, Lowell Richards', and other KRAB programs special was that they weren't just playing cuts off a playlist, or "free form" ego tripping. They spoke intelligently about the music and provided insight into what was going on. It wasn't background music. It was education via radio. Where is that now? For anyone interested in "bop", the KRAB.fm archive just shared a short article that Nick wrote in 1969.
Jeez, what I would give for a copy of that digital archive he made of those records. It's sad that so much of that music is destined to be lost (or at best, hoarded in private collections) because of the ridiculous duration of copyright and practical impossibility of securing licenses.