Although some EP’s were released in the time following their 2010 debut album, it took until 2014 for the second album to be made available on Lionel Ziblat’s own label. This new album illustrates life, portrayed as a cycle consisting of several inner cycles, and each time a cycle ends, another one starts, and these movements are often frightening, painful and traumatic, but they also offer a chance for change and for growth. The named musicians joining Lionel in this were Tristan Hupe (keyboards), Maarten Bakker (bass guitar/keyboards) and Willem Smid (drums) with yet more guests who are un-named. I love this quote from the band, which probably does a better job of summing up this album that I can, “It might seem impossible at first to have a grip on the band’s musical style. How would one go about trying to explain an inconceivable mixture of Rock, Soul, Baroque, Ska, Jazz, Punk, Symphonic Rock, Sicilian Tarantella & Romanian Gypsy music? Still, it is the great pride of the band having chosen not to succumb to any particular existing category and to simply embrace music in all its glory.”
As one can easily see from the list above, this is music that is defying all attempts to categorise it, apart from throwing into the crossover progressive rock as that is really the only place that fits with their refusal to accept any musical boundary and then throwing melodic pop into it as well! This is vibrant, exciting, and their quirky ska-style take on “(Oh) Pretty Woman” must be heard to be believed. It’s awesome. Towards the end of 2015 Lionel issued the following statement, “In case you were wondering about the band these days, I personally took some time off to work on several different projects, composing and arranging music for different ensembles and other productions. But I'm also contemplating recording a couple of new albums. When the time comes, you will know.” I only hope that we do see him back with more material at some point as Modest Midget are a quirky, nonsensical great band. For more details visit www.modestmidget.com
