ONCE HUMANITY...

TISARIS ? Once Humanity

Here we have Tisaris at their best! All good promises and expectations anyone could have when listening to their first and previous work, What´s Beyond, were fulfilled here. Excellent art cover work; a concept album with a passionate lyrical content; all the members of the band playing together in a very mature way; compositional skills at top; and so all of those aspects led to a very homogeneous album but with some very strong and elaborated pieces. There must be special attention in hearing songs like Once Humanity, Once In Time and Silent Prophecy, where you can identify all the aspects which were commented above.

Once Humanity strongly matches four stars. I did not consider only what I said above; but also the surrounding conditions for these guys almost 20 years ago. This is definitely not easy or simple for them to perform the work done at that time with available resources, and not only did they make this excellent work, but also two more clearly progressive works sharing many things in common . This is an important point because it makes it possible for us to see their work as a whole. One can identify a fine artistic story being told through their three albums. Also, one can see a nice progressive musical project they got to achieve!

This kind of "story" is something clearly crucial for me when it comes to progressive music. What are the intentions of musicians when composing a progressive album - or even any other king of music? - It is nice to search for interactions among cover paintings, lyrics and music, as for example, when one tries to see interactions that a guy like Rick Wakeman put in his instrumental masterpiece "The Six Wives Of Henry VIII" relating music and personalities - even if it was only imagined personalities, art has this kind of freedom. - It is interesting to see that it was exactly the lack of a "story" in the musical work of the well assessed Brazilian group Bacamarte that led me to rate them much lower.

Once Humanity deserves everyone´s attention due to everything said above. Probably with some strong influences of Brazilian folk I could give them five stars; but I comprehend it would change their art proposal so much, when translated by means of music.

3.5 really

Tisaris is one of the better examples of symphonic prog acts from Brazil in the '90s. Offering 3 albums in that period Tisaris manage to recive aplauses from listners and respectable reviews specialy for their second album Once Humaninty. Issued in 1994 their second album is considered by fans their best from all 3, I'm agree while I was not very impressed overall. This is a concept album clocking around 70 min with long instrumental parts going from pure symphonic prog to more spacey passages. If the instrumental arrangements are pleasent most of the time, I was not impressed by the voice and how vocal parts are composed here, to much time very theatrical, not really intresting to my ears. The album overall is complex, very nice are the guitar parts, even great, keyboards aswell, a perfect example is the opening track . Once Humanity, very worthy symphonic prog piece with the ingredients to be a strong tune, the rst are ok with some plus on the middle of the album who is almost entirely instruemntal and very good aswell. So, a very decent and fair work by this unknown brazilian band, is clear that they worked hard on this release, but I can't say is something really excellent and inovative. Fans of symphonic prog can take some spins I think Tisaris worth to be discovered by many listners as possible. Similar maybe at some point with High Wheel, and bands who incorporated in their symphonic prog arranagements spacey long instrumental parts. 3 stars rounded to 3,5 for some pieces.

Once humanity is the pinnacle of Tisaris trilogy and more than an excellent addition to any symphonic prog lover. You will like it if you like Pink Floyd The Wall, Gilmour's post-floydian guitars, and also Roger Water's post-floydian composition. Production, dynamics, voices have all greatly increased over the previous album. Once Humanity, Once in a time, are among the best tracks, full of all that you can expect from a nice symphonic prog : languishing guitares underlined by piano arpeggios (or the opposite), step tempo changes, bombastic moments, crying voices over strings ensembles, organ chords, etheral choruses over acoustic guitar - and melody. The Sophia Conflict is a nice echoing pair, the first track driven by acoustic guitar and organs, the second by electric guitar and piano. Laodicea, Silent Prophecy, Sub-particle are instrumental tracks, pleasant but forgottable. Christopher's Trance I is more roccky than else but symphony is back with Christopher's Trance II, Armageddon an Amen (the best piece in my opinion).