I don't really know too much about it, but from what I have read, which I'll admit isn't a great deal, it seems to be an incredibly intellectual endevour.

With tone rows: it's almost like aesthetics are thrown out the window in favour of sticking to a system. I'm not saying that I don't like atonal music, but that it seems that serial composition revolves more around the procedure than any aesthetic inspiration...

Am I wrong? I'm expecting to be...

Serialism is completely about the procedure and the mathematics of it all. Some people may get some aesthetic value out of it, but not me.

I'm not against throwing in a 12 tone row but I wouldn't base an entire track on it.

I suppose a more modern extension of serialism is the likes of generative music.

There's more than one way to use "serialism" in music. Schoenberg thought of it as a temporary fix while he searched for a way out of major/minor tonality. It's value depends on whose writing it.

Like David Gilmore always said, "Give a man a Les Paul and he doesn't become Eric Clapton."

Alban Berg and Dallapiccola have a very lyrical style. I'd suggest listening to them again.

What's generative music?

Where people use formulas to make notes like fractals or whatever, so the tune is made completely of mathematics.

How does it sound? Do you know of any generative composers?

Autechre's Confield album is mostly generative.

I'll look into that.

So what sounds are actually produced? Are they actually identifiable tones?

Yeah they are. I think Autechre use it quite extensively on this, even for rhythm patterns.

ligeti's piano etudes are all about the generative processes and fractals