Tba (2)

TBA (ტბა) was an alias used by experimental electronic musician Natalie/Tusia Beridze primarily between 2003 and 2011, at the early days of her career. The moniker had varying meanings: "lake" in Georgian, a common abbreviature for "to be announced" in English, and it carries the composer's initials T.B. Beridze's debut album as TBA came out in 2003, soon after she landed a record deal with Thomas Brinkmann's label Max Ernst and relocated to Cologne, Germany. Two versions, 299799 LP and "self-titled/untitled" 211405 CD, had a significantly different tracklist. In 2005, TBA presented her sophomore CD album, 429173. Beridze's third full-length work for max.E, 700574, came out under TBA EMPTY alias, accompanied by two 12" singles, and characterized by a much more minimalistic, reductionist sound, reminiscent of Brinkmann's "ultra-minimal" techno. Beridze concluded her collaboration with the Max Ernst label by an ambitious "concept album" trilogy, * - ** - ***, spread across two albums: Size And Tears 2xCD (with one of the chapters inspired by Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland") and 1127474 CD. Both albums carried a joint credit, reading "TBA / Natalie Beridze" on the back cover and "TBA Tusia Beridze" on the shrinkwrap sticker — a design layout that Natalie adopted for the rest of TBA releases. In 2007, Beridze returned to Tbilisi, Georgia. Two years later, Natalie released her sixth album, 3702625, on Laboratory Instinct label. The CD artwork had the artist's name printed as TBA_Natalie Beridze. In 2010, Natalie Beridze / TBA released her digital-only 2452509 EP on the German label Monika Enterprise (she first appeared on the label five years prior on the 4 Women No Cry Vol. 1 2x12"/CD compilation). A full-length album Forget'fulness followed in Spring 2011, featuring Ryuichi Sakamoto on one of the tracks. Beridze is still on Monika Enterprise's roster and released two more full-length albums and an EP for the label. However, she stopped using TBA as the moniker after 2011, with all current works credited to her full name Natalie Beridze.