Pennywise is named for the evil clown in Stephen King's novel It.

And until recently, the band's popularity didn't extend too far beyond the community of killer circus performers.

But the punk band is finding much more than cult success with its album "Reason to Believe," now in the hands of more than 600,000 fans - the most in the band's 20-year career.

And its single, "The Western World," is the highest-charting single the Orange County band has ever had.

The key to the band's recent success, guitarist Fletcher Dragge said in an interview, is that the band essentially gave away its album.

"We wanted to try something different, and MySpace is one of the most powerful forces on the globe," Dragge said.

For the first two weeks the album was out - it was released on March 25 - "Reason to Believe" was available as a free download on the band's MySpace page. Since then, more than 600,000 copies of the album have either been downloaded or bought in stores.

The reason, Dragge said, was that bands make their money from touring, not album sales. The rule of thumb is that for every album sold on a major label, the musician gets $2.

"Album sales have been declining since Napster," Dragge said. "In the old days, touring was to promote albums. Now, [touring] is our sole source of income."

The band's partnership with MySpace has led some fans to accuse the band of abandoning its independent principles to follow the money, but Dragge disputes that.

"We took the lowest recording advance in 10 or 11 years," he said. "There was no fat paycheck. Haters want to associate [the deal] with selling out."

The band will join the Vans Warped Tour this summer.

"It's my summer camp," Dragge said. "Some of the Warped tours are the most memorable we've had."