What’s in for this season in music software? Cellular automata. You may have been exposed to a cellular automaton in the classic Game of Life; it’s basically a very simple biological simulator exposed as an intuitive, 2-dimensional grid of squares. If tic-tac-toe, Charles Darwin, and a petri dish of bacteria got together in one wild evening, you’d come up with something like this as a result. The Game of Life has been around since mathematician John Conway invented it in 1970, but lately it’s been cross-bred with music software to help patterns escape the rigid, boring repetition of traditional sequencer grids.

Cellular automata is in fine form on the beautiful, strange homebrew sequencer for the Nintendo DS, GlitchDS, which has had ongoing updates. It’s still fun as ever in Reaktor 5’s Newschool preset (old news, but enjoyable nonetheless). But in what’s so far the most anticipated plug-in release of the fall, CA takes on particularly powerful sonic possibilities in the first “experimental” release from beloved plug-in boutique Audio Damage:

Automaton [Product Page, Mac AU/VST; Windows VST]
Cost: US$49.99

Since the cellular automata grid can control anything, it’s what you hook it up to that matters — and that’s especially important, because it means instead of a set of knobs or sequence grid doing the same thing over and over and over and over again, CA “evolves” on its own, bringing much-needed change to your music. Automaton is a combination of a flexible CA sequencer with four effects:

1. Stutter (modulates a buffer, so you can combine Automaton with existing beat loops and patterns)
2. Modulate (a self-modulating ring modulator)
3. Bitcrush (which includes AD’s own “error” setting)
4. Replicate (based on their Replicant effect, which goes even further in the beat slicing realm a la Ableton’s Beat Repeat)

I’ve been playing around with the beta, and it’s just fantastic. I hope to finish off some special CDM presets and share them with you, though I’m a bit behind — let’s see if I can top the presets that come with the tool. One of the hallmarks of Audio Damage’s software in VST format is lots of MIDI learn support, and since it supports VST automation I anticipate some fun combining this with Kore. Either way, think easy tweaking and live performance control.

Now, question math geeks: any other cellular automata aside form the Game of Life that work well with music? I’m sure there are some experimental music projects out there that have used other CA, so link away.

Here are two tutorial videos of the tool in action, in case you haven’t seen them already:

Mobile music suites date back to the first PDAs; the Palm has long been a stand-out platform with apps like Chocopoolp’s wonderful Bhajis Loops. The iPod Touch and iPhone have been a hotbed for development, thanks to sharing development frameworks with the Mac. That led our iPod/iPhone software round-up to be bursting with good stuff. But lacking a final SDK from Apple, many of the options were, admittedly, early in development or toy-like.

Intua’s new BeatMaker, a complete music studio, looks more like a real music tool. The basic functionality:

• Mobile sampler: 16 pads for editable sample playback, slicing, and pattern recording. (I hoped this meant you could actually record on the fly, but it looks like you can’t.)
• Step sequencer with an interesting-looking interface, pictured above
• Effects: two channels with beat-synced delay, 3-band EQ, and bit-crushing distortion

Intua Product Page

We’ll be watching for news from Apple this week, which should give us a better sense, hopefully, of what Apple’s developer plans are. To me, the restrictions so far (limiting features, eliminating multi-tasking, and requiring distribution via official Apple outlets) dampen some of the appeal of the platform. Likewise, so far we’ve seen basically “hacked” development – and quite frankly, it’s been more interesting as a result. We should know soon more about what officially-sanctioned development will look like for music. BeatMaker could be one of the first generation of apps to fit that category.

And lest I just seem sour, to me the larger point is that OSes come and go; what we’re really seeing is richer capabilities on mobile devices. Apple certainly deserves credit for making that vision most apparent in a shipping device.

The DS’ stylus and touchscreen make an ideal pocket-able interface: they’re coupled with friendly, conventional arcade buttons, but provide precise control of visual interfaces without using a mouse. (Touch with fingertips is not nearly as accurate, especially on tiny screens.) That’s already inspired quite a bit of music software, but GrooveStep earns extra points for employing a friendly interface for easy, quick pattern sequencing.

Me-too 49-key controllers have been mind-numbingly dull for the most part. The new Akai MPK49, revealed in Frankfurt at Messe, easily qualifies as different. Not only does it add trigger pads as found on the MPC line, but there’s an onboard arpeggiator, functionality borrowed from the MPC, and additional MIDI control options, as well.

1. It’s a control surface: 8 endless encoders, 8 sliders, and 8 backlit switches, each of which can be controlled via 3 selectable banks (8 x 3 = 24 “virtual” controls each, 72 controllers total).
2. It’s a transport control: Start/stop transport buttons that actually send MMC or MIDI start/stop messages. (I shouldn’t have to say that, but not all controllers’ transport buttons actually do.)
3. It’s an MPC-style controller: 12 pads, yes, but unlike the pads on the Korg Kontrol49 or the M-Audio Axiom, it actually functions like an MPC, with note repeat and swing functions. Hopefully the quality will be closer to a standalone unit, as well.
4. It’s an arpeggiator: Akai’s mum on the details, but there’s an onboard arpeggiator in the unit — a rarity in controllers.

And it’s got a full-sized, 49-key keyboard, expression input (thanks!), and a big LCD screen. Looks terrific, though my only question is the quality of the keyboard; I’ve been a bit disappointed with recent entries from Alesis on reliability and feel. (Alesis, Akai, and Numark are now made by the same company; you’ll notice the similarity of this to Alesis’ MIDI controller line.) No pricing or availability yet, but given this unique combination of features, we’ll definitely be watching.

First seen at VJ blogger S.O. Sample’s site, and I have to say, this could be an unbelievable VJ keyboard.