If you want to be pulverised by vigorously pompous melodrama, the giant pipe organs that take pride of place in churches and cathedrals are the most potent of musical weapons. Unashamedly bombastic instrumental epics hammered out with eye-watering gusto, Neogothic Progressive Toccatas eschews subtlety in favour of wilfully obtuse neo-classical freak-outs performed on organ, bass and drums.
There are parallels with the more preposterous end of the ELP and Rick Wakeman catalogues, but this is a far more shadowy proposition, with swivel-eyed exercises in key-hammering excess like Progressive Magdeburg and Neogothic Pedal Solo sounding more like the soundtrack to some long-lost and deeply macabre early 70s horror flick than anything the average churchgoer would tap a toe to.
The highlight is a wild reinterpretation of Profondo Rosso by Italian prog heroes Goblin, which retains the sinister thrust of the original while adding a subtle undercurrent of heretical disquiet, as organ pipes strain from the force of the resonant tones powering through them.
Not for everyone, but there’s enough might, energy and grandeur to make any pro-prog vicar shit himself.
