Metal and pipe organ fusion is reconnecting audiences to music
Three University of Huddersfield music academics are continuing to combine an unusual blend of heavy metal and pipe organs to satisfy a growing thirst from audiences to connect with music in the face of AI and streaming.
Dr Mark Mynett, Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production, Dr Andrew Bourbon, Subject Area Leader in Performing Arts, and David Pipe, Music Tutor and Organist at the Huddersfield Town Hall, recently took the Organic Metal: Two Worlds Collide project to the Town Hall for a concert featuring Mark’s band Plague of Angels.
David accompanied the band on the venue’s famous Father Willis organ, which dates back to 1860.
It was not the first time that the Town Hall’s pipe organ has been used for a metal concert, with the venue having hosted the Organic Doom show for Kirklees Year of Music in 2023.
Plague of Angels played at St Paul’s, the former church on the University of Huddersfield’s campus, in May 2024, for an event that was filmed for the BBC’s One Show. This was followed by a groundbreaking show in front of 1,400 people inside York Minster just under a year later.
Plague of Angels' show on campus was featured on the BBC's One Show.
But as well as giving audiences an extraordinary auditory and physical experience, given the combined power of the band and the large pipe organs in the venues, the band’s performances are flying in the face of how experiencing music has become a more solitary pursuit.
“This is the age of algorithms and curated music, but we are finding that audiences want a fully immersive, anti-AI experience,” says Mark.
“I think there's a real thirst, in this AI era, for something that cannot be replicated digitally. People are seeking out an embodied physical experience.”
Plague of Angels’ next gig is at the Hull City Hall on 23 May, where they, together with David Pipe, will play along with an organ that, with 5,400 separate pipes, is one of the largest in the country.
London’s Royal Albert Hall boasts a pipe organ with 9,999 pipes and its organist, Anna Lapwood, has become a social media star with her online performances as well as accompanying artists including Florence + The Machine and RAYE.
Mark, who hopes that Plague of Angels could play at the famous London venue, explains that audiences are delighted to feel as well as listen to the band when it is in unison with the power of a pipe organ.
Feeling the music as well as hearing it
“There's a real gap in the market now in that people are seeking a different experience, and the ultimate is this instrument that's the size of a house.
“You feel it in your chest, it's called tactile transduction, where you don't just hear the frequencies. You can feel the frequencies from 32-foot-long pipes. And then you combine that with a metal band in civic and sacred spaces, you end up with something that's immersive in 360°. That is something that algorithms just cannot provide.”
As well as adding a powerful element to the band’s sound, playing along with pipe organs is helping to highlight a need to preserve the instrument as a whole. It is believed that four pipe organs per week are scrapped or sent to landfill, and Mark hopes the band’s unusual approach can shine a light on those that remain in churches or civic spaces.
“The one in Huddersfield Town Hall, a Father Willis organ, is an exceptional instrument and we are lucky that we have David Pipe with us.
These pipe organs are part of British culture and part of our heritage, and they are often in places that can be used increasingly as community hubs as well as places of worship.
"If these spaces with these amazing instruments could be used in new and different ways, then future generations will still be able to experience the unique qualities of pipe organs.”