UMUR "Drown in Darkness – The Early Demos" is a compilation album by UK doom/death metal act Paradise Lost. The compilation was released through Century Media Records in May 2009. Tracks 1-3 are taken from the 1988 "Paradise Lost" demo, tracks 4-6 originally appeared on the 1989 "Frozen Illusion" demo, and the remaining tracks are culled from a live bootleg demo from 1989 titled "Plains of Desolation". There exists en even earlier 1988 one-track demo titled "Morbid Existence", but it featured an early rehearsal version of the track, which was only distributed to friends and to some underground magazines. The "Morbid Existence" track also appeared on the "Paradise Lost (1988)" demo and therefore also on "Drown in Darkness – The Early Demos".

So the material on "Drown in Darkness – The Early Demos" are half studio demo tracks and half live bootleg tracks. It´s almost needless to say, but death metal demo tapes from 1988 and 1989 usually feature a pretty lo-fi sound quality, and the same can be said for the sound quality on "Drown in Darkness – The Early Demos". At least for the material from the 1988 "Paradise Lost" demo, which sound like it´s a 4-track recording done in the band´s rehearsal place. The material from the 1989 "Frozen Illusion" demo features a more clear sound, and the live tracks actually feature a pretty decent sound quality too. None are professional recordings though, so it´s with those expectations you need to meet this compilation.

Considering that these are recordings from the late 80s, it´s quite amazing how developed Paradise Lost sound was at this point. Nick Holmes has a commanding brutal growling delivery, the downtuned riffs are crushingly heavy, and the atmosphere is thick with morbid darkness. It´s not often you´ll find death metal recordings from those days, which feature almost no thrash metal elements and actually sounds 100% like death metal. Paradise Lost definitely were pioneers of the death metal genre in it´s purest form.

The premise of releasing a demo compilation is almost always that it´s a hardcore fan item. And "Drown in Darkness – The Early Demos" is of course not a release for the casual listener either (they should pick up the debut album instead). But that´s not to say it couldn´t be of interest to those who want to learn about the early beginnings of death metal, and especially the early beginnings of the doom/death direction of the genre. Upon conclusion there is both enough quality and history here to warrant a 3 - 3.5 star (65%) rating.