20 episodes
The Modernist Society Jason Mojica and Eric Ottens
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- Society & Culture
The Modernist Society began as a DJ night in Chicago, became an debaucherous salon in DC, and comes to you now as a podcast wherever you happen to be. Each month, hosts Jason Mojica and Eric Ottens bring you intimate conversations with practitioners of the high and low arts, replete with all of the esoteric digression you've come to expect from the medium.
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Johnny Berger of Jake's Pizza
We dive into the world of Chicago pizza, the perils of small business ownership, family drama, family trauma, and what constitutes a good tip for a delivery driver with Johnny Berger, author of a zine on these very topics called Jake's Pizza: 40 Years in the Pizza Business, and Other Stories. Jake's Pizza also happens to be the name of the pizza joint that Johnny's family ran in Franklin Park, Illinois for 57 years before its unceremonious demise in November of 2023. We talk to Johnny about what happened; about his forays into comedy, filmmaking, and writing; and about what comes next.
This episode is dedicated to the memory of William "Bill" Berger July 13, 1936 — May 12, 2024.
Buy a copy of Jake's Pizza at heykidscomics.net!
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Noah and Reza from Uni Boys
In this episode, Eric goes rogue and interviews a band from WAY after the 1970s, otherwise known as "now." Noah and Reza from the Uni Boys talk about their band, plans, cleaning products, records, and other topics.
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Uni Boys
The Lemon Twigs
Billy Tibbals Band
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Fifi from Firestarter
This episode we take you to one of the most unique places on earth - Poor Cow.
You may know the owner from such hit bands as Teengenerate, American Soul Spiders, The Tweezers, and Firestarter. If you’re interested, skip the shinkansen and don’t feel bad about temples. The Modernist Society Podcast validates that Poor Cow is not only a legitimate part of Japanese culture, but is The Real Temple.
4th floor in a nondescript building, walk in and you are guaranteed to see most of the following regulars:
Tsune from Young Parasian
Honma from Car Crash
Hiroshi from The Knocks / Flashlights
You just landed in Tokyo and you already have friends!
Closed Mondays. Follow Fifi for day to day updates.
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Jason Mojica
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Eric Ottens
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Robert Whiting
We chat with Robert Whiting, author of Chrysanthemum and the Bat, You Gotta Have Wa,
Tokyo Underworld and Tokyo Junkie. Robert moved to Tokyo in 1962 as part of the U.S. Occupational Forces and has lived there on and off ever since. He believes Tokyo may current the best city on Earth, and his enthusiasm is infectious. But it wasn't always that way. Robert talks us through his early days in a city still rife with black markets and crime, using baseball as his window into the language and culture and eventually publishing his first book on the topic, a pending screen adaptation of his Tokyo Underworld book, and his latest memoir Tokyo Junkie, which looks back on his 60-year love affair with the city.
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Bayard Winthrop of American Giant
We catch up with Bayard Winthrop. He’s the founder and CEO of American Giant, a San Francisco-based clothing company that specializes in a) making stuff really well, and b) making it in the USA. American Giant has been going for about 10 years now, but before that Bayard ran Chrome, Freeboard, Atlas Snowshoe, and in the heady days of the dot com boom, was the President and CEO of WebChat, which was a big online community that was acquired by Infoseek right before AOL started dominating that space. That's all to say that in addition to producing the "the greatest hoodie ever made," he's a super interesting, super smart guy who’s been an incredible innovator not only in direct-to-consumer businesses, but in breathing new life into at least on area of American manufacturing.
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Jeff Pezzati of Naked Raygun
We hang out with Jeff Pezzati, singer of Chicago punk legends Naked Raygun and talk about all of the things: AC/DC, UFO, Big Black, comic books, Philip Jose Farmer, HVAC, Condor, and the forthcoming Naked Raygun studio album.
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