HIVE1

2015 album from the former Battles member. Written and recorded throughout 2013 and 2014 Hive1 marks a new direction for Tyondai Braxton his first album in six years since 2009 s Central Market and his first recording for Nonesuch. Most significantly after having several of his large-scale orchestral works performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic London Sinfonietta and Wordless Music Orchestra Hive1 is the composer s first fully realized work of purely electronic music since his earlier loop-based music in the early 2000 s and an unmistakable swerve away from Braxton s signature materials and musical concerns to date. Where the dominant influence on Central Market was the Stravinsky of Petrushka and The Rite of Spring Hive1 draws more from the mid-20th century avant-garde a world inhabited by the likes of Varèse Xenakis and Stockhausen along with the more contemporary examples of Florian Hecker Carston Nicolai/Raster Noton and Braxton s frequent collaborator Ben Vida who appears as a performer in Hive 1. Where Central Market was scored for a small army of strings guitars horns kazoos and singers the music of Hive1 derives from the abrasive textures and manipulation of organic and synthesized sounds.