The Lost Vinyl Scratch Tape

by That Gamer

Rating: teen
Tags: Comedy, Random, Slice of Life, DJ P0N-3, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other
Length: 4286

A short story about what may have happened before "The Vinyl Scratch Tapes", adapted from a transcript of a lost pre-radio tape.

What exactly happened before The Vinyl Scratch Tapes? Some of you might know, but presented here is another take on the story, adapted from a transcription of a cassette recorded pre-fame that was supposedly lost, but was eventually found in a box in Vinyl and Octavia's basement. So what exactly's on that tape? Well, long story short, it's probably nothing like The Vinyl Scratch Tapes. Short story long, well, just push play.

A take on The Vinyl Scratch Tapes by Corey W. Williams (from someone who's never read it).
Cover parodies Live'r Then You'll Ever Be, that Rolling Stones bootleg.
Special thanks to AABowser (who helped in writing it) and Johndeanwinchester (who proofread it).
No thanks to the anonymous frog who showed up during the writing.
Rated "T" just to be safe.
Original script-fic can be read here.

Published 2014-06-09 00:10:02 UTC
Last updated 2014-06-09 00:10:02 UTC

(PLAY)

The Lost Vinyl Scratch Tape
Hosted by Vinyl "DJ P0N-3" Scratch
Featuring special guests Lyra Heartstrings, Sweety Drop, Twilight Sparkle and Octavia Melody
Originally recorded in Vinyl Scratched Studios on June 10th, 2011
Originally transcribed by That Gamer on July 26th, 2012
Original transcription edited by Hellfilly Deluxe on
Adapted to story by Hellfilly Deluxe, with help from AABowser on July 7th and 8th, 2014
No thanks to the anonymous frog that showed up during the writing

“Hello there, Equestria!” DJ P0N-3 (better known to everypony in Equestria as “Vinyl Scratch”) began a brand new recording, smiling a ridiculous smile nopony but her could see. “Welcome to my show! Yes, it still doesn't have a name, go figure. And here with me as always is Octavia Melody!… 'Tavia?”

DJ P0N-3 looked around for a couple moments or so, just wondering where in the world her housemate could have gone. She was sure Octavia had followed her to the basement, but apparently not. She was about to start guessing where she could be, but she got her answer in the form of a door slamming upstairs. “Oh, it seems she just left,” DJ P0N-3 observed, laughing a forced laugh. “B-but that's OK. I'm still here!” She forced a chuckle and sang, quite poorly actually, “The show must go on!” After that, she shuffled through some paper, trying to find her notes and hoping she would remember that to edit that out later. “Anyways, today, I'm going to have Lyra with me and I'm…” She quickly flipped to a different note. “…going to interview her since Twilight says she's busy. Funny how she's always said that. Anyways, please enjoy my mixes while I go get Lyra.”

As DJ P0N-3 said, a mixtape was put on with a loud click. It sounded like typical electronic jazz. In the background, DJ P0N-3 could be heard arguing with Lyra, but nothing could be made out, save for a few instances of “No, really?” Three or so minutes later, just as the double bass was about to drop hard, the mixtape was shut off.

“And here I am, back with Lyra!” DJ P0N-3 announced. There was a moment silence, which got broken by “Lyra, why are you standing on your hind legs?”

“Why aren't you?” Lyra asked from the background.

“Because I'm normal!” DJ P0N-3 replied, sounding quite rude. “Now get over here!”

In response, Lyra muttered something under her breath and made sure to knock something over while making her way to DJ P0N-3’s little desk.

“…What was that for?” DJ P0N-3 asked. It was a vinyl record Lyra had broken, and it was now laying in pieces on the floor. It was a blank one anyways, so DJ P0N-3 didn’t care all that much about it.

“For insulting the way I walk,” Lyra stated the obvious. “Anyways, let's… Let’s just get this interview over with.”

“OK, um…” DJ P0N-3 shuffled through her papers some more. “Man, I really should have gotten organized before doing this thing… But anyways, how long have you been in PonyVille?

“Since 2008, like most ponies,” Lyra said.

“You sound less excited than normal,” DJ P0N-3 pointed out. “What's, uh, the deal?”

“You, alright?” Lyra’s tone suddenly got a lot more annoyed. “If you can't let me be the way I wanna be, then why be here?… Yes, I’m still on that.”

DJ P0N-3 laughed a little, and it wasn’t a forced laugh like earlier. “'Cause I'm paying you!” she said. “Why else?”

“You owe me 5 bits.”

“Yes, yes,” DJ P0N-3 muttered, quickly brushing the topic aside. “Anyways, lighten up. Our listeners wouldn't want to hear somepony as depressing as you.”

“We're in your basement talking to a tape recorder.”

“You're ruining the illusion!” DJ P0N-3 shouted. She cleared her throat and continued in a quieter voice, “But anyways, next question… Do you really want to be human?”

“W-what? No!” Lyra looked a little shocked. But only a little. “How did you even find out about that? Not that I really wanna be a human. It’s just a rumour!”

“Everypony in PonyVille knows that!” DJ P0N-3 stated that as if it were the most obvious thing in Equestria, which it probably was. “Besides, I have photos.”

Lyra narrowed her eyes. “You don't.”

DJ P0N-3 nodded. “Oh, but the funny thing is that I do!” She held up one or two with MAGICK. “See?”

“Give them!” Lyra demanded.

“Well too bad, I don't wanna!” DJ P0N-3 said. “Even though that’s you in them, I took them, so they’re my legal property!”

“Oh, daughter of a-” What followed next was a series of crashes, which probably meant the two were fighting over the pictures like children.

“There, now you have your stupid photos!” DJ P0N-3 yelled. “Now can we please continue?!”

“Sure,” Lyra said in a much calmer tone then DJ P0N-3, ripping the pictures to little pieces. “But first, I have a question for you. Why did you write my name as Lyra Vynn?”

“Hey, I ask the questions around here!” DJ P0N-3 reminded Lyra. “But, since you're wondering, does anypony here remember Vera Lynn?”

There was a long pause that followed. The only sound was DJ P0N-3 turning on a different cassette player that made cricket noises. It was turned off after a few moments.

“What, just me?”

“Yeah, just you,” Lyra said in a monotone.

Following that, the sound of a door closing could be heard upstairs, which caught the attention of both Lyra and DJ P0N-3.

“I think Octavia's back,” DJ P0N-3 stated. “I mean finally. She bailed on me earlier-”

“I know, I heard,” Lyra interrupted.

“Hey, only I can do that,” DJ P0N-3 said. “Anyways, that was really rude of her. Let me go fetch her.”

“Wait, what about-” But before Lyra could get out any reasonable argument, DJ P0N-3 had already gone upstairs. Lyra sighed to that. “Fine, I'll take on the host duties.” There was a beat as Lyra tried to figure out exactly what to talk about, ignoring the arguing going on in the background “So I heard something about Princess Celestia… Or was it Luna? Eh, I’ve heard ponies say this about both of them. But anyways, apparently one of them was, uh, abandoning her duties to play with… Something. It’s this device I’ve never heard of before and forgot the name of it. It starts with a ‘W’, I know that. That’s but still weird, isn’t?… I didn't know she had so many straws down here. And… And root beer. And pie. Vinyl's weird. Or maybe she’s trying to be like Pinkie. Either way.”

Not too long after Lyra said that, DJ P0N-3 came back down, and, sounding only a little annoyed, said, “Well, apparently Octavia quit the show without telling me. Again, she can be so rude sometimes a- and hey! Gimme my mic back!”

“I didn't touch it,” Lyra said as DJ P0N-3 pulled the mic closer to herself.

“You're touching my root beer,” DJ P0N-3 pointed out, taking that away as well.

“Hey! I wasn't finished with that!”

“You can have it after the questions are done,” DJ P0N-3 stated, putting the can near the edge of the table, which was actually half off the edge, which caused it to fall of the edge and land with a clink. “Aw, I spilled it. But that's not- My rug! No!”

“It's not important,” Lyra said, watching as DJ P0N-3 stared at the floor in horror. “I thought your motto was ‘Nothing is real’ or some other abstract concept you shouldn’t be able to understand.”

“Except for the rug!” DJ P0N-3 said, looking to Lyra. “It was really real! It was real as the seventh Element Of Harmony!”

“There is no seventh Element Of Harmony,” Lyra said. She opened another can of root beer and took a sip from, annoying DJ P0N-3 a little, but not to the point where it took her mind off of the rug. If anything, it made her think about her rug even more.

“Nothing is real!” DJ P0N-3 made sure she heaped extra amounts of emphasis on “is”. “If the seventh element is unreal, it makes my carpet real since, if it's unreal, my motto makes it real!”

“That has no logical reasoning behind it!” came Octavia’s voice from upstairs.

“Hey, you shut up!” DJ P0N-3 shouted back. “You're not even a part of this anymore! Ugh…” She opened a bottle of something using MAGICK and took a big swig from it. “I love P0M Wonderful. All the pomegranate I've come to expect from a drink like this.”

“Hey, don’t you suddenly start advertising on me,” Lyra said. “We still have an interview to finish, remember?”

“Right…” DJ P0N-3 trailed off and shuffled through some more papers while Lyra sipped from her drink. “Man, I’m really unorganized. These are all questions for next week’s guest. It’s gonna be this filly named Cavern. She told me she used to be invisible.”

“Yeah, I’m no expert on magic or anything, but that seems highly unlikely,” Lyra commented.

“She gave me some pictures as proof,” DJ P0N-3 said. “It has to be true. But, uh, let me just skip a couple… None of these are really that good. Especially that one. I don’t even wanna look at it. Regardless, have you always been friends with BonBon?”

“First of all, she changed her name to Sweety Drops,” Lyra began. “And second of all-”

“Why the buck did she change her name to that?” DJ P0N-3 asked, sounding a tad skeptical. “I liked BonBon better.”

“I have no idea either,” Lyra shrugged.

“So are you going to answer my question?” DJ P0N-3 asked.

“I was about to,” Lyra replied, “but you interrupted me.”

“Yeah, but I’m allowed to do that,” DJ P0N-3 explained. “I am the host after all. I got, like, host powers you don’t.”

“…You’re so…” Lyra glared at DJ P0N-3 for a second or two. “But anyways, to answer your question, we’ve been friends since forever. In fact, if you want her opinion on it, she's right here.”

“But I didn’t-” DJ P0N-3 only got partway through that sentence. She was intending for it to be a lot longer, but then she looked to her right slowly and noticed that, in deed, Sweety was there. To say the least, DJ P0N-3 wasn’t exactly expecting that. “AHH!! How did you get in here?!”

“Um…” Sweety too wondered about how she got there, and she was about to answer, but-

“On second thought, never mind,” DJ P0N-3 said quickly.” Just stay there and be quiet. If you don't, I'ma call up Derpy and get Screwball on yah.”

“Don't you dare threaten my best friend with that weirdo!” Lyra snapped. “Well, uh I mean, Derpy isn’t that weird. She’s actually quite nice. A little childish, but, uh… It’s her. But Screwball? Now that’s a weird pony if I’ve ever met one. No wonder everypony thinks she and Discord are related somehow… Honestly.”

“This is going nowhere,” DJ P0N-3 muttered to herself. Usually, it took her interviews an hour or so before they got to that point, but this appeared to be a special case, and she didn’t want to deal with it anymore. She said to the two other ponies with her, “Um, that's all the time we have for you, Lyra… You can leave now. As in, right now.”

“Thank Faust,” Lyra said as she got up. “C'mon, Sweety. Let’s get out of this crap and into something that’s actually interesting.”

Sweety nodded and followed her good friend upstairs, DJ P0N-3 watching the whole time. Once she heard the door close upstairs, she sighed in relief.

“So that was Lyra and Sweety,” DJ P0N-3 told her tape recorder. “Needless to say, I probably won’t be having them on my show anymore. Why?… Uh… I have better ponies to talk to. Like that filly I mentioned, Cavern. How we met is actually a pretty funny story, but that’s for next week. So, uh, for now, next on my show, I’m going to, um, give you a weather report! For today, obviously. It’d be so weird if it was the same weather whenever you’re listening to this.” She chuckled at the thought and dashed upstairs to check to see how it was out. She was back seconds later “OK, it is raining. Over just my place. That is so weird.”

“If you'd actually look, you'd see that it's raining all over PonyVille,” Octavia spoke up once again.

“You're not part of this!” DJ P0N-3 yelled back. Pause, then she said to her tape recorder, “Anyways, Octavia being dumb aside after these songs, we're going live to street… Once it stops raining, that is… Uh…” Another pause, this time a lot more awkward. “I'm a born level puller!” she proclaimed before the mixtape was put on. Some more electronic jazz played, picking up from earlier. Right before the song ended, there was a rough cut to DJ P0N-3 outside.

“OK, now it's time for my street report,” DJ P0N-3 said, nearly drowned out by the wind. “It's stopped raining, which might sound normal to you, but here’s, like the weird thing. Everywhere else looks dry! Really dry. Right near me and Octavia’s place, it’s wet, but nowhere else. I can’t believe Octavia would lie to me, and just after quitting my show too! But anyways let's, uh, go find a random pony to talk to. Like this one! Hey, you! Get over here!”

“What, what do you want?” asked the random pony as they came over to DJ P0N-3.

“I'm DJ P0N-3 and I'm part of a…” she quickly tried to think of the right word to use, and eventually decided to go with, “Show. Right now I'm doing my street portion!”

“OK. Why are you talking to me?” the random pony asked.

“Oh, right. In my street portion,” DJ P0N-3 began to explain, “I, um… Tch… Ask ponies my question of the recording! Yeah, that’s it.”

“Do I have to?” they sounded annoyed.

“C'mon! Please?”

“Look, Deadhor5 or whoever, I don’t want to…” the random pony sighed. They’d figured out that DJ P0N-3 probably wouldn’t leave them alone until they went along with it. “Fine, what's the question?”

DJ P0N-3 smiled, but then got all serious when she asked her question: “Who were The Rutles?”

“The… The Rutles?” the random pony repeated.

“Yeah, I said The Rutles,” DJ P0N-3 confirmed it, sort of muffling out Derpy, who could still be heard, but like many other instances earlier, nothing could be made out. “I dunno what’s so wrong about that. Anyways, who were they?”

“I don't know!” the random pony said quite bluntly. “I don’t care who they are!”

“You sure?” DJ P0N-3 couldn’t believe this random pony. “You must know something! Everypony I know knows who The Rutles are.”

“Well then, I guess you just met somepony who doesn’t,” they said. “Can I go now? I got places to be.”

“If you’re gonna be such a spoilsport, then go,” DJ P0N-3 said. “I don’t need somepony like you ruining my tape.”

The random pony didn’t say anything to that. It was just better for them to trot off and mutter things under their breath.

“…Well, you know what they say,” DJ P0N-3 said a moment or two later. “You learn something new everyday, and I just learned that I don’t like whoever that pony was. I should edit that out later… And now I gotta find somepony else to talk to! Great. Making my job harder…”

What followed was an incredibly long silence, longer than any others on the entire tape. It was a real mystery why DJ P0N-3 decided to keep it in, but considering all of the other stuff she left in, it’s likely she never got around to doing it.

“Hey, there's Rainbow Dash!” DJ P0N-3 said following that long, long silence. “I don't know why she's walking… Seems really unlike her, I but need somepony to ask and I guess she’ll do. Hey, Rainbow, can I ask you something?”

“Not now, OK?” Rainbow replied. “Like, I gotta be somewhere really soon and I can’t stick around here.”

“PLEASE?” DJ P0N-3 begged. “This'll only take a second! Seriously!”

“No,” was Rainbow’s response. “Now really, I have to go.”

“Why? What's wrong?” DJ P0N-3 asked. “Does it, uh, have to do with the fact that you’re not flying? ‘Cause, like, seeing you not flying is really weird. I don’t know if anypony’s told you… But, uh, yeah, what’s wrong with you?”

“I… I don't wanna talk about it,” Rainbow muttered.

“…You’re wingless,” DJ P0N-3 said. “I just noticed that. Have you always been wingless?”

“Uh… I gotta go,” Rainbow said and ran off.

“I was just asking!” DJ P0N-3 shouted after her. She groaned and said to herself, “What the buck… That’s the second pony that’s run off today! That’s never happened before! OK, it has happened, but that was one… Two… Actually, it was one time, but this is the second, and this segment is going on for way longer than it normally does, but I can’t just end it now! I gotta ask somepony my question!” Pause. “Eh, I'm bored. I can edit this out I guess… I can say something about technical difficulties or whatever.”

DJ P0N-3 started to say something else, but then it rough cut back to her studio.

“OK, enough of that,” DJ P0N-3 said to her recorder as she sat back down at her desk. “So next up on my show we will… We will, uh… BonBon, why are you still here?”

“I'm in your basement,” Sweety answered through a full mouth, “eating your pies. And my name’s Sweety, not BonBon.”

“I don’t care, get outta here,” DJ P0N-3 said, pointing upstairs.

Sweety swallowed before she answered. “Fine, I'll eat 'em upstairs.” And she did go upstairs, right as Octavia was coming downstairs.

“That vas odd,” Octavia commented when she got to DJ P0N-3’s desk.

“I know, right?” DJ P0N-3 agreed. “Ponies… What’re y’gonna do? Anyways, next on our show, Octavia will give us her weekly book review. Now, what book do you have for us?”

“I'm still not sure hov you convinced me to come back…” Octavia muttered. She then cleared her throat and said to the tape recorder, “Vell, this veek, I read a fev books, but the one I vant to focus on is an interesting one… I think it vas trying to rip-off the Daring Do series, and vhile it vasn't bad, I can't say it vas perfect… On second thought, scratch that. It vas bad.”

“If you're talking about the book I think you're talking about, I loved it!” DJ P0N-3 said. “Like, there was this part with the fridge and then there was this explosion! It was like BOOM! And the-”

“Vell, personally, I think it's statistically impossible,” Octavia said. “An explosion vould destroy a fridge, regardless of hov it's made.”

A door opening upstairs could be heard, followed by hoof steps and slightly drowned out by DJ P0N-3 saying, “But it was awesome! Stop ruining everything with your stupid logic.”

“Just because it's quote-unquote 'avesome' doesn't mean it's good in any relative vay,” Octavia said, keeping a calmer tone as opposed to DJ P0N-3’s. “And I bring in logic because, up until that moment, it vas trying to be realistic, and that tone change doesn’t vork for me. Aside from that utterly ridiculous moment, the book was sloppily vritten, there vas no flov vhatsoever, and there vere a ton of plot holes. I just couldn't get into it. Overall, it gets tvo hooves dovn.”

“Well, I give it… Whatever the opposite of down is!” DJ P0N-3 said. “And it’s up. I'm not stupid.”

“If you're not stupid, then Rainbov Dash really is a lesbian,” Octavia said.

“If she's a lesbian, then Pinkie Pie has wings!” DJ P0N-3 exclaimed.

“Actually, I did see then vhen I vent out earlier, but that-”

“What's Equestria coming to?!” DJ P0N-3 shouted in an overly dramatic manner.

“Dunno, but I forgot my root beer down here!” Lyra could be heard all of a sudden, coming downstairs and apparently talking to Sweety.

DJ P0N-3 could obviously hear Lyra. “Your root beer?! It's mine!”

“Yeah, but I opened it,” Lyra pointed out.

“So?” DJ P0N-3 asked.

“I drank from it,” Lyra said.

“So?”

“My name is on it!” Lyra pointed, and indeed, there it was in cursive.

“So?”

“So it's mine!” Lyra said. “Now just give it to me, OK?”

“OK,” DJ P0N-3 said. “You can have it for ten bits.”

“What the- You owe me five!” Lyra shouted.

“Great! Now give me the other five!”

“I don't owe you anything!” Lyra yelled in frustration. “You owe me!”

DJ P0N-3 laughed at that and said a faux British accent, “Surely you jest.”

“No, I'm not,” Lyra said. She’d almost had it.

“And stop standing on your hind legs!” DJ P0N-3 added to her previous statement.

And there was the last straw, “I will walk on my hind legs as long as I want to!”

The two then started yelling over each other, with Octavia being merely an observer to the whole spectacle.

“Vell, that escalated quite quickly,” Octavia remarked to herself. “I honestly thought Lyra didn’t have that short a temper… Or at least be able to put up vith Vinyl. She vas doing so vell earlier, so I don’t know about nov… Oh, this thing is still on. Uh, ve'll be right back, I guess.”

The tape then clicked off, only to click back on to what seemed to be a minute later.

“Vell, it seems that Vinyl and Lyra are fighting over that can,” Octavia told the tape recorder. “Honestly, vhy does Vinyl have to start these things? She can be so immature sometimes… So anyvays, for nov-” There was a crash that made Octavia stop for a moment, but then she got right back to it. “Uh… So for nov, I'll be taking, uhm, hold of this.” She then muttered to herself, “Vhy am I doing this? Nopony's going to listen this and nopony ever vill!” There was a few seconds where she thought about what would happen if somepony did, but she didn’t really want to, so she just got back to the recording. “Um, anyvays-” Another crash. “Anyvays, I-” Yet another crash, followed by a phone ringing.

“Vhat in the vorld…?” Octavia hadn’t encountered a phone before, so she was understandably confused at the sound of one ringing. It took her about three seconds to figure it out. “Oh, Vinyl has a phone. I vonder vhen she got that. I guess it isn’t important. So hov do I use this thing?” She pressed on it, and it didn’t explode, so that was a start. “Uhm… This is Octavia speaking.”

“Hey Octavia, this is Twilight,” the phone said in Twilight Sparkle’s voice, which meant that Octavia had done it right the first time around. “I was kind of expecting Vinyl to answer, because she’s one of the only five in Equestria to actually have a phone… Makes me a little embarrassed that I got it wrong so many times. Anyways, I'm having a bit of an-” Another crash. “Uh, what's going on back there?”

“Nothing,” Octavia explained hurriedly. “You were saying?”

“Right.” It was a little obvious from her voice that Twilight didn’t believe Octavia, but if she said it was nothing, it was probably nothing. Besides, she had more important things to worry about. “So, uhm, I'm having a bit of a problem over here… I… I may have kind of accidentally swapped me and my friend's horns and wings.”

“Hov in-” Octavia started, but was interrupted by a crash. “Hov in Equestria did you do that?”

“Uhm… Magic does a lot of weird things,” Twilight replied.

“One of these days, that excuse isn’t going to vork,” Octavia said. “Regardless though, I hope this is all sorted out soon.”

Yet another crash, than Twilight said “I wouldn't be using that word… ‘Soon’…” Then she hung up.

Octavia pressed another button on the phone and nothing else happened, so she assumed she did it right again. “And that vas Tvilight,” she told the recorder, just as the background struggling was starting to die down.

“Fine!” DJ P0N-3 yelled, sounding really out of breath. “Y-you can- You can have your stupid root beer! I don’t like diet anyways! Just get out of my basement!”

“Thanks,” Lyra told DJ P0N-3 before leaving.

“That lousy unicorn…” DJ P0N-3 muttered under her breath, getting back to her desk. “Why I oughta-”

Octavia cleared her throat that moment, which managed to stop DJ P0N-3 from potentially saying something offensive.

“Oh, right,” DJ P0N-3 said, noticing that the recorder was still on. “Next up-”

And that’s where the tape cut off. It was never mentioned again until DJ P0N-3 played the tape in its near entirety on one of her shows. Octavia was not very happy about it, especially when found out that DJ P0N-3 had sold her cello… Again.

Author's Note

And there's the story. There's not a whole to say about it, except for that it's double the word count of the original story (which was about 2,300), this was written in Google Docs, and as I've said in the description, I have not read the original story. You could call that "Complaining About A Show You Don't Watch" or "Shallow Parody", but I like to consider this "Early Installment Weirdness" or something like that. So anyways, I hope you enjoyed it, and please make sure to comment. I like getting comments.