To tease the appetite of "Drown" fans until the next release (the band has secluded itself in a press black out during Fall of '99 to focus on recording their next offering), "Drown" has let some of the demo versions from their "Product Of A Two Faced World" hit the streets under the title of "Throwing Away The Demos." Truly sounding like demos, these songs (if nothing else) show what production can do for a band's sound. This is a very gritty mix with guitars suffering the fate of most demos, being generally washy, lacking in any definite crunch and falling behind in the mix. Singer Lauren sounds like he's screaming from the garage next door and scaring the kids in the neighborhood.

Lots of electronic elements being felt at weird levels due to the "demo"-ness of this, all adding to songs of interesting nature, but lacking some in the punch dept. "Stranger, Killer, King" starts out the disk with heavy guitar stutters and infectious lead work almost sounding keyboard-like. Lauren conveys his tortured lyrics of abuse (drug and otherwise) over tracks wrapped around electronic spines, bound with whiney riff guitars, and gives it up passionately. Chew on some gravel and you'll get an idea of the singer's vocal tone. Basically the sound most fans familiar with the band will embrace. "The Selfish Ones" is a humble electronic track with warm keyboards and deep room drums. Reminiscent of the dryer sound the band achieved on its first album, "Hold On To The Hollow," it poses the question "Are you listening?" to a junkie's admissions. The recording in general will need some forgiving from those not used to anything but the slick production model, but it's this rawness in unpolished form that should be the charm for any "Drown" fan. Sure to be a limited pressing, a nice slab of raw, angst ridden, hard indie rock, with liberal electronic tempos offered in "as-is" form for the fans. It's Real.