UK churches need open-mindedness to preserve heritage says heavy metal musician

Mark Mynett with Plague of Angels’ vocalist, Anabelle Iratni. Mynett said the hostility towards heavy metal was because ‘opera and classical are often seen as high culture, whereas metal music is often seen as working class’. Photograph: Richard Saker/The Observer

A heavy metal band whose show at York Minster has been called an “outright insult” to Christianity has said the church is “sleepwalking” into oblivion unless it becomes more open-minded.

The English rockers, Plague of Angels, provoked a backlash last month from parishioners who described the concert in April as “shocking and deeply inappropriate” and threatened to protest outside the 800-year-old cathedral.