Is Mathias Spahlinger: Farben Der Frühe atonal throughout? I didn't listen to more than a minute.
What are its characteristics that are appealing? I realize it's hard to explain why we like a piece, but I'm curious.
Yes it's atonal throughout though there are points at which it parodies or alludes to tonal procedures.
I appreciate your curiosity. This is music that will always appeal to a very limited audience because it's not about tunes that lodge in the memory, the harmonies are frequently harsh sounding and the rhythms, disjunct or aperiodic.
What appeals to me about Farben Der Frühe is the vast range of textures and techniques (both compositional and performamative) employed. The piece moves through areas of tremendous complexity into other areas of great delicacy and simplicity and it fascinates me to hear the processes involved in arriving at these different musical spaces and how they relate to one another.
Not the least interesting thing about this kind of music is the amazing virtuosity on display by the performers (and the composer). You might argue that errors in performance would be undetectable but, if you listen carefully, you can hear how exactly coordinated all the various parameters of the music are with each other (rhythms being the easiest of these to perceive) and how precisely interlocked together, through the most forbiddingly intricate structures, the performers are.