“Pain to Power,” by Manchester rock outfit Maruja, is a descension into hell itself. It pulls no punches and shows its listener the deepest and darkest parts of themselves.
By Gavin Majeski
Editor’s Note: This review is a stylized change of pace compared to the previous reviews that have been featured on this blog. This article does not strictly follow AP Style, and chooses to take a more subjective approach.
My passion for writing stopped around the time I moved to Portland in 2023. My new job began to envelop my life, and all of my free time became dedicated to Magic the Gathering, the only thing that brought me a sense of fulfilment.
I had the realization after graduating college that I don’t have the same drive to write like some of my college peers did.
When I started writing for The Daily Emerald, University of Oregon’s student run newspaper, I quickly found out how much I began to dread the deadline of my weekly arts & culture piece.
I realized that writing content which was easily digestible to a college student audience wasn’t something I enjoyed.
I started posting on this blog because I felt like I couldn’t talk with anybody about the music I was listening to. It felt that these ideas and strong emotions were being suffocated. Sure, that’s how I felt back in 2018, but it sadly still feels pretty accurate to this day.
Even with the advent of websites like Rate Your Music and Album of The Year, or the creation of college clubs that meet weekly to discuss a chosen album, it seems there are always cliques of people that believe your opinions on music are inferior to theirs.
This is probably why I disliked film majors in college.
With a change in interests, lifestyle, and general priorities, I only revisit this site to post when a truly special album comes around.
“Pain to Power,” by Manchester rock outfit Maruja, is a descension into hell itself. It pulls no punches and shows its listener the deepest and darkest parts of themselves.
Yet, within the horror and pain, there is a candle that refuses to extinguish.
Describing the musical stylings of Maruja is like asking someone that works at the humane society what their favorite type of dog is.
You won’t get a straight answer.
Utilizing post-rock progressions, pummeling drums of progressive rock, the intricacies of jazz rock, dissonant guitar chords of noise rock, and the aggressive hip-hop vocal cadence of political acts such as Rage Against the Machine, Maruja packages each of these styles into a perfect, one-of-a-kind listening experience.
There are shorter tracks, such as “Bloodsport,” “Break the Tension” and “Trenches,” which all hover just around four minutes in length. They are blisteringly fast and do not let up from either a vocal or instrumental perspective.
One might think these tracks are a representation of the experience a person would face when traversing through the circles of hell.
But the worst thing about man’s descent is the longer, more grueling experiences. The ones that take so much time, that when you look behind your back, everyone in your life is long gone.
This type of experience is what makes up the vast majority of “Pain to Power,” with over half of the album consisting of three nine to ten minute songs.
It is this experience that tests one's faith in themselves.
From a lyrical perspective, the journeyman we are traveling with through hell is none other than Maruja lead vocalist, Harry Wilkinson.
Wilkinson’s faith is tested for fifty crushing minutes, as he takes one last look at society before he is drowned in the Styx.
While observing, he realizes how truly flawed humans are; how we are harming instead of helping ourselves, and how there is something we can do to change this.
In the final track, “Reconcile,” we reach the end of our journey, to which Wilkinson leaves us with some final lines of encouragement before we are told to “have no fear,”
“Take us, heartache, we bleed, no faith
This place, engraved, footsteps, we trace
No love, more waste, these traits, we break
Uplift ourselves and turn our fate
Will you pray for love? Pray for love”
Favorite Tracks: ALL
10/10
Stunning writing; despite never listening to the album, I felt completely enmeshed in its essence while reading this review. With prose this good, I’m willing to bet that the author is really handsome (but that’s just my humble opinion). 10/10.
10/10 comment