The year was 1989. Aragon Amori, Paul Ledney, Brett Makowski and John McEntee joined forces to form a Death Metal act by the name of INCANTATION. Prior to INCANTATION, Aragon and Brett were involved in a band called BLOOD THIRSTY DEATH, while Ledney and McEntee played in REVENANT. Due to artistic differences, Paul, Aragon and Brett left the band to form PROFANATICA the following year. Influenced by such classic cults as VENOM, NECROVORE, SARCOFAGO and BATHORY, the unholy trinity together had a passion to create raw and sacrilegious Black Metal. In the summer of 1990, they unleashed their first demo entitled “Putrescence Of…” After receiving much praise in the underground from this tape, PROFANATICA released a second demo called “Broken Throne of Christ” in December of the same year. Brett Makowski was unable to participate in the recording of this demo, so the band recruited an old friend John Gelso to step in on guitar. John was previously involved with Paul in the Black / Death band TOTEN during 1987-1988. Both demo tapes eventually caught the interest of After World Records. PROFANATICA signed a deal with the label and in 1991 they released the infamous “Weeping in Heaven” 7″ EP, strictly limited to 500 hand-numbered copies. Following the success of this EP, After World chose to re-release it on cassette with two bonus live tracks the following year. Also in 1992, the band signed a deal with the French Osmose Productions (a fairly new and uprising label at the time) to release a second EP. The EP turned out to be a split 12″ with the Colombian band MASACRE. During this time, PROFANATICA extensively toured the north eastern United States, often shocking many with their sick and blasphemous live act. As the end of the year approached, both guitarists officially left the band. Paul and Aragon invited their close comrade Wicked Warlock of Demonic Blasphemy (these days known as Ixithra) of the band DEMONCY, to perform the guitar work. The three of them played one gig together, and were planned to participate in an American Black Metal festival that Halloween appearing with ORDER FROM CHAOS, VITAL REMAINS, ACHERON, etc. However, this gathering unfortunately never took place. Instead, they entered the studio together to record a full-length PROFANATICA release initially entitled “The Raping Of The Virgin Mary”. Sadly, the master tapes of these recordings were destroyed in the studio (there are conflicting stories about this), and the band parted ways quickly after. Paul formed HAVOHEJ in 1993 with some assistance from Brett Makowski on bass and guitars. Aragon pursued his Black / Death project CONTRIVISTI until his untimely death in 1996, and Wicked Warlock continued on with DEMONCY, who are still very much active in the American Black Metal underground to this day. In early 2001, Paul Ledney recruited two new members and resurrected the cult of PROFANATICA. A 7″ EP of brand new material was scheduled to be released on Necromantic Productions from Michigan. The band also planned to do some shows in the Connecticut area… and then, there was silence?!

Paul, tell us a little about PROFANATICA’s history, and why you chose a Black Metal style?
“Well, me and Aragon used to be in INCANTATION with John McEntee and our other guitarist Brett, who played on the “Weeping In Heaven” EP. We just had different ideas about wearing make up and to try and be the blackest band. And McEntee didn’t want it. He didn’t really know anything about the occult or anything. He just wanted to play brutal music. So we just stopped calling him. INCANTATION was our name. He never asked us if he could use the name. He just reformed behind our backs. I had already had the PROFANATICA logo and concept ready. So we started it in June ’90, a week after we dumped John. I played drums and sang, Aragon played bass and Brett did guitar. We did the first demo which was called “Putrescence Of…” in June ’90. Two tracks which were ‘Raping Of Angels’ and ‘Final Hours Of Christ’. We rehearsed those two songs for like a month and then recorded it at the end of June. The 2nd demo was in October. That was called “Broken Throne Of Christ” and it was with the new guitarist named John Gelso. He did both guitar tracks. It was a 4 track demo. Like a rehearsal demo done on a 4 track. The songs were ‘Of Pestilence’, ‘Scorging And Crowning’ and ‘Weeping In Heaven’. Then we released the “Weeping in Heaven” 7″ EP on Afterworld Records, with Brett again instead of John – because John was in school. It had ‘Heavenly Father’ and ‘Weeping In Heaven’.”

How long have you been into Black / Death Metal?
“Since I knew about it, which was the early VENOM albums and the HELLHAMMER record “Apocalyptic Raids”.”

What are some of your fave bands and LPs?
“My favorite LP of all time is “Rock And Roll Over” from KISS. It has the greatest sound. I also like the first three BATHORY LPs and “Morbid Tales.” I can listen to those LPs and never get sick of them.”

What bands influence PROFANATICA?
“Old VENOM, old BATHORY and HELLHAMMER.”

Who writes the lyrics?
“Me and Aragon split the lyrics. Most of the time I write them. But I do most of the blasphemies and Aragon does most of the lyrics.”

What are they like?
“To profanate anything sacred and holy. Everything white must be black. Like ‘Raping Of Angels’ is: “Masturbate on the throne of god, Crucifixion of a thousand saints, Stakes are mounted with the heads of angels, Nocturnal spells are casted, Heaven begins to bleed…” The lyrics are almost short stories, but they’re not. I don’t like to print or publish the lyrics, they’re personal to me. But the lyrics are all blasphemies. Things like ‘Masturbate Upon God’. It’s offensive, but true, in as much as I am saying what I mean or feel. It’s not for shock value, but it is shocking.”

What’s the song ‘Weeping In Heaven’ about?
“It’s a little desecration thing. It was going to be called ‘Tears In Heaven’ at first. We didn’t change it because of Eric Clapton. ‘Weeping In Heaven’ sounds better. But if we had ‘Tears In Heaven’, we would’ve kept it. It’s just about spilling black vomit on the walls of heaven.”

What about your music?
“Me and John do the music. Aragon’s really good if I humm him a riff or play it on a keyboard. He can play it right back to me. And he’ll teach it to John.”

I understand that PROFANATICA is into total blasphemy and desecration of god and christianity. Could you explain why?
“Just after years and years of watching TV evengelists rip off people. It’s all so backwards and hypocritical. We have our own dark power that works for us. We believe that no God should stand before us.”

What does the name PROFANATICA actually stand for?
“It’s Latin. It stands for the “Profanator Of Heaven”. Our friend who teaches English at a college in Connecticut thought of the name because he studies dead languages and things like that. And we wanted a name that nobody else had the same meaning. So it’s “Profanator Of Heaven” or “Desecrator Of Heaven”.

PROFANATICA is self-proclaimed as “the most unholy band in the world.” Do you think that this image makes people actually buy your material, or would you hope that they buy it on the strength of your music alone?
“I don’t know. We just want people to know before they buy it what it is. And once they hear it, they should also know what it is. Because a lot of people said that we were the blackest band here in the US. But we play our music better than most of the bands in Europe. So, we’re definitely the most unholy band going right now. That is what I think.”

In the trendy world of Black Metal today, what are your feelings on all of these bands proclaiming that they are the most brutal and Satanic bands around?
“Probably I think the most brutal band is IMPALED NAZARENE. Because they play good. And it’s so aggressive. The bands from Norway I think are kinda a joke. Anyone can take a lot of drugs and put on make-up, that’s what I think.”

So, what do you have to say about all these “true” bands from Norway?
“Bands that claim they’re true aren’t true! That’s like someone saying how big their cock is. It’s definetely small! If they talk about it all the time. Except for us. I don’t really put a label on where bands are from, but the Swedish scene is definately retarded and Norway is not far behind that. There’s so many bands that play the same style and rip off from each other and other bands, that it’s just ridiculously fake!”

What about BURZUM?
“I’d like to say to Count Grishnakh that the only reason for his hatred is jealousy. That’s it.”

If you had to choose a handful of bands that you think are true Black Metallers, who might they be?
“IMPALED NAZARENE, NECROMANTIA, ROTTING CHRIST, BEHERIT and BESTIAL SUMMONING.”

What do you think about bands like DEICIDE and MORBID ANGEL in terms of the images they have portrayed over the past few years?
“I don’t think either band is Black Metal. Not only because of how popular they are, because VENOM was more popular than both of those bands. And they, VENOM, were totally Black Metal. I heard Glen Benton is really into what he is saying. I just think that MORBID ANGEL turned into another SLAYER. And I was never a MORBID ANGEL fan. Not even of the old stuff. Old influences for us are old BATHORY and POSSESSED.”

How deeply are you into Satanism??!!!?
“We’re into our own deal. It’s that we are the most powerful and nobody can touch us. We’re into black perversion. We shit on God. We are larger than God and he is smaller than us. That’s the way we think. We put down false religions. But we have our own beliefs. So we kind of make our own Satanism.”

Would you consider yourself a Satanist?
“I would, but a lot of other people wouldn’t. I believe I am my own God and nobody can judge me, and nobody is more powerful than me. I indulge in pleasurable perversion. People have so many different ways of looking at it, but I don’t believe Satan is an actual entity. It’s just a worship figure, but a lot of people do think of Satan as a real god. Maybe they’re crazy, why should their “master” care about someone like them anyhow?”

Where do you draw your Satanic belief from?
“Mostly Crowley. His book of the law really opened my eyes. Satanism is anti-religion. I don’t believe in any Gods. I suppose it’s good that some people gather for black masses with their corresponding dark beliefs, but I think everybody should think for themselves. If everyone thought the same way then that would be hell on earth.”

What do you think of Anton Lavey?
“I don’t really. I know he doesn’t look to good in that little devil costume he wears. I wore one of those costumes for Halloween when I was nine with the pitchfork and that’s all I’m gonna say…”

What do you feel about organized Satanic churches like the Church Of Satan?
“I don’t agree with them. Take the Church of Satan magazine – “The Black Flame”. On the back they had this ad, I can’t remember the exact quote, but it said “Imagine your friends’ delight as they drink coffee out of their Baphomet mug.” I can’t remember how much it was – around $15.95 – but it was the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen. There were copies of “The Black Flame” being handed out at our gigs and there were some of our roadies, who were Satanists, who wanted the mug and couldn’t appreciate what money-making junk it is. When that many people get together in a church, it’s hard not to get involved with cheesy stuff like that ad. Satanic churches and so forth are just more organized religion. I believe in hate, because hate is the strongest emotion. On the other hand, I don’t believe people can go on hating forever without lying to themselves because you’d no longer be able to function.”

Do you think the “Necronomicon” was written by Lovecraft as a joke?
“Well, it was written as a joke – kind of. But I think it was 1/2 real and 1/2 fake. HP Lovecraft is a great writer. One of my favorites. But if someone believes in Pazuzu, then he exists. That’s the way I look at it.”

Ever have any rituals?
“Yeah, we do our things that help us. And the definately work. We believe 100%, so of course it works.”

Does your faith involve violence?
“Not at all. I believe if someone hits you in the face, hit him back twice as hard. There’s lots of people that I hate, but I just let it come.”

Do you kill things???
“No, I’ve never killed anything. There are people that I want to kill definetely and maybe will kill. But I haven’t so far.”

What do you think of love?
“I don’t know – I love sodomy.”

Ever crave raw flesh??
“Flesh of nuns fat ass. That’s about it.”

You like asses?
“I love ass! Ass is my main perversion. Sodomy is illegal and it’s definetely the best part of a woman. There’s no question about it! There should be no such thing as pussy! They smell and they’re only to pee out of. Ass is the real deal! I love ass!!”

Are you into oral-anal sex???
“YES!! I definetely eat ass. I eat shit and ass!!”

What does your mother have to say about all this?
“She knows we’re definetely the unholiest band in the world and the most desecrating! But she’s the head of religion in this area. Nobody wears a cross in this area without her knowing about it.”

So are there positive aspects to your faith?
“Definitely. It is a way of getting out aggression but it has many hints of my personal beliefs – it’s not just some fairy tale. The positive aspects of my faith don’t all come out throught the band. My philosophy helps me get as much money as I can, get as much pussy as I can, drink as much as I can. But I try and balance all of it out. Indulge and compete.”

Why is there so much nudity in your publicity shots?
“Besides that we have really big cocks – I think it’s totally pure. It symbolizes we’re totally for real and don’t need big armbands with spikes or upside down crosses. We can just play totally naked which is how we were born. And have it just as black and sick!! We did these publicity shots at around the same time as the other band, IMPALED NAZARENE, covered in cow’s blood. We came up with the idea of making the whole thing more black and perverse, because that is what the whole PROFANATICA project was about, the blood and nudity were symbols of that. If we play live, the whole band will be totally naked, bathed in blood, urine, and semen live. I want actual shit and worms gnawing at bibles on stage.”

In a PROFANATICA video clip, your bassist masturbated on a holy bible and then you, Paul, licked it off. Can you enlighten us with an explanation of this?
“(loud laughter)… Well, those guys dared me to. I really just spit on it. It was really no big deal, just another joke. We had brought this video to that trendy Relapse Festival in Rhode Island and showed it to a lot of people, like Jeff from VITAL REMAINS and the INCANTATION guys. I just wanna add here – we’re definately not homos! A lot of people think we’re gay. We’ve had more pussy then any other band in the U.S.! And we masturbate on the cross in video and live in front of fans. We do shit on the cross. We stick crosses up our asses and shit them out. We drink cum, urine and blood. We do it for our shows, but we’d do it alone anyway. We believe in perversion and darkness and destroying the deceiver skinny jew bastard fuckin’ asshole Christ!!”

How’d you hook up with Osmose? How are they treating you guys?
“Herve is a great guy. He’s into Black Metal. He’s not just a business man. But I get frustrated with payments and sending letters and materials back and forth. Sometimes I just want to say fuck it! Let’s just do a really sick rehearsal and not put out anything big. But, he’s definetely on our side and he wants us to profanate the heavens as much as we can. He heard one rehearsal we did in ’90 and he sent us a letter saying “What would you think of being on our label?”. We just immediatley wrote back and said “We’ll do it!” We offered to pay for the studio time, but he said he’d definetely pay.”

Tell us more about your split album with MASACRE.
“Well, at first we did not want to do the split… we were really upset because we wanted not to do a full length LP, but just an EP. It was only supposed to be limited to 2000 copies on 12”. And that’s it. And then do a tour on that. So after argueing for months and months, we just had these tracks recorded. This time with Brett and John on guitar. We said “Ok, release it.” We’re still upset our logo is on the front. It was supposed to be that faded picture of us on a white background. SPV said they wouldn’t take it without a logo. But we didn’t really give a shit about SPV. I say let the true fans get it and they’ll know who we are. The full length LP, we’re in the studio now. It should be out in September or October on Osmose. It’s going to be titled “Sodomy Of Sacred Assholes”.”

Did you think of that title???
“Yeah, I thought of that name! It was going to be called “Raping Of Angels” at first, but we changed it. It’s all about perversion and total blackness and desecration. All new tracks will be connected with intros. It’s sort of a cross between “Under The Sign Of The Black Mark” and “Seven Churches.” It was totally our fault that the split sounded so bad. The guitar sounds were weak and there was a noise gap on the hi-hats that deepened it and made everything sound like it was going backwards. We just got bad sounds to begin with.”

What songs will be on it?
‘Cries Of A Pale Saviour’ – that’s new! ‘Fucking Of Sacred Assholes’, ‘Golden Gates Torn Down’, ‘Disease Infested Cunts Of Dead Nuns’ – which is going to be the second song…”

Is it all new songs?!?!??
“Well, there’s ‘Scorging & Crowning’ from the second demo. That’ll be on it.”

Is there any reason why you named the album “Sodomy Of Sacred Assholes”??
“That was the best title for it. The cover shows two white demon goats raping the angel right in the ass – of course!! That’s the only way to have sex! It just fits the picture. We wanted a title that was brutal that had to do with what we sing about… which is black perversion and desecration and raping fat nun asses.”

Will the band always maintain its occult approach lyrically, or will you venture off in the future?
“We’re not gonna venture off. We’re just gonna get blacker. It’s gonna be the exact same subject… total blasphemy. I’ve had some new ideas though. Some of the new song titles are ‘March Of The Seven Priests Of Mockery’ and ‘Nazarene Decomposing’. It’s the same idea, but more brutal.”

I thought the album was scheduled for a September ’92 release, what happened?
“Well, we had some recording problems with mixing. Something happened with all of the reels. We recorded the whole LP and someone sabotaged our reels. I can’t say who it was, even though we know. We have to go in now and re-record the whole thing. It might not be out until the beginning of ’93.”

Give us an idea of what PROFANATICA is like live.
“It depends on where we play ’cause a lot of people make a lot of trouble in the USA about shows. But – we prefer to play naked, covered in blood, just like IMPALED NAZARENE! But, we’ve incorporated shit and urine into our live shows. We rub shit on crosses and drink urine and spit it on the book of Jehovah – which is the book of lies! We spit on the skinny Jew Christ any day!! Every show we definately do this and we have a bible with earthworms that come out of it. As much as we can do, we try to. If there’s one person in the club and he’s a true fan, we’ll do everything we can if the club allows us to!”

What clubs have given you trouble?
“Well, we just played that show in Rhode Island that was really, really, trendy! Bunch of asshole bands! Relapse Records sponsored it – of course! The kings of trends! But – we couldn’t do anything because they said we’d have to sign a paper saying we’d pay for the monitors, which was $20,000. Which I don’t believe ’cause the sound wasn’t that great there! We didn’t think it was worth it, so Aragon had soaked his white shirt in pigs blood that we got two weeks before and just wore that. Which was ok. Could’ve been worse. I was behind the drums, far back so nobody could see me and it was almost impossible for me to come in the front and spit on the book and drink the urine. Which I was going to do and eat the worms and spit them back on the book. But it wasn’t worth it. It would have taken me at least 20 minutes to get out of the drums.”

Did you guys get paid for that show?
“No, we didn’t get paid at all! I just said we didn’t want any money, that they should bow to us and they were lucky we came out to Rhode Island. That’s what I told Jim Fleet!!!”

I understand that your band members slit their arms before a gig like MORBID ANGEL used to do. What is the significance with this?
“We just do it for fun, as a joke. It was really nothing big.”

What about the tour in Europe with SAMAEL and ROTTING CHRIST???
“We were told we were going to be on the first Black Metal tour ever – which was IMPALED NAZARENE, IMMORTAL, MASSACRE, MASTERS HAMMER and a bunch of other bands. But SPV didn’t like the sound of our split. I don’t really blame them, but we were told we were going to be flown over there after that. We’re not going on that one now…”

Any country in specific you’d like to play?
“I would like to play in Norway because there seems to be a couple trendy bands that claim to be true Black Metal that came out of nowhere. All the true bands know who the fakes are in Norway.”

When you rehearse, do you sing and play drums?
“That’s a great question! Nobody has ever asked us that. When we rehearse, I just play drums. The last half hour I sing. We do it like we do live. It depends on what we are rehearsing for.”

How’s your mail?
“People who wrote to me and didn’t get a letter back, there’s a reason why. All the true people get answered. Anybody who sent me money for our demos, they where out early ’90 and ’91. Nobody should be sending me any money now! I’m not the record company! We’re in the band! We’re very upset with all the mail coming in from ‘zines that just want free CDs and demos and shirts and shit! You can get everything from Osmose. So do me a favor and don’t bother me, bother them! Because that’s what you’re doing – you’re bothering me! My address is no longer the band address because nobody deserves to contact us!!!!!”

What do you see in the future for PROFANATICA and your musical progressions?
“I think we’re untoppable and unstoppable. I’m just thinking positive. I can’t see the band ending. We are not going to put a damper on the lyrics or artwork. It’s just going to be brutaller and brutaller. I see us going on for a long time. Even as long as VENOM, which was pretty long – I think. Our music is actually gonna get a lot more simple and faster. Like the old fast tracks of BATHORY, like ‘Massacre’ and ‘Total Destruction’. The songs are short already, but there’s gonna be even shorter ones blended together with like one-second pauses so they’ll run right into the next. We had the idea of doing intro’s between each song, but ACHERON did that and so did IMPALED NAZARENE.”

What do you see in the future for this Black Metal phenomenon we are experiencing?
“I think it doesn’t matter how many bands do it to make it trendy, if bands keep doing it good, then it won’t get trendy, no matter how much coverage it gets. Most of the bands, or 95% of the bands from Norway and all of Europe can’t play their instruments at all. I don’t even call it music. I just call it a sad attempt at Black Metal. At least the bands from the US know their instruments. I heard NECROVORE was reforming. Now there’s ACHERON, us and CRUCIFIER from the US. I think Europe is making it trendy with all of the bands from Norway. They use samples on the guitars and they just don’t know how to play.”

Any particular way you want to die?
“I would like to die while blowing a load in a nun’s ass! By dying from a heart attack from too much excitement! That is the ultimate way!!”

Do you want to die?
“I don’t want to die now, but if there was a nuclear war, it would be the best way to die because everything would go at once. Instead of one person who doesn’t deserve it. The person who deserves to die the most is the Pope. He’s definately the fakest man on the face of the earth!”

Would you care to make any closing comments to anyone?
“Just to all the bands in Norway that think they are black, like EMPEROR, BURZUM, THE TRUE MAYHEM, DARK THRONE. I’d like to say that the “cold winds” have nothing to do with playing the music. Black Metal should be in the heart. The only band I like from Norway is IMMORTAL.”