Scratching Without Vinyl!

You can get a scratch effect without vinyl by using the scratch modulation settings even with the “vinyl demod” menu for your group set to “off”. If you haven't already read it, read the part at the end of the previous section, “The Power of Pink Vinyl,” that describes scratch modulation. What you'll be doing is using the LFOs by themselves, without any physical scratching of vinyl.

The scratch you get this way is mechanical sounding, but what the heck. All you have to do is have the corresponding “vinyl demod” menu set to “off”, and enable the turntable button and the play button. Go to the Scratch Settings tab, and either enable the scratch modulation or click on the momentary buttons marked “1” or “2.” You should hear the effect; if you don't, you probably have the LFO modulation set up to “No Mod” (not a surprise, since that is the default setting). Set it to “AM Mod” or “Sum Mod.”

There's another way of scratching audio which is kind of neat: you can use incoming audio to scratch the audio files in your Ms Pinky session. Sure, won't sound quite like a turntable scratch: it's a straaaange new kind of effect, never seen before on Br-Broadway...

It's very simple to set up: merely send any audio into your computer (preferably a stereo signal) and setup Ms Pinky to respond to it just as you would set Ms Pinky to respond to the MsPinky vinyl playing on your turntable. In fact, if you already have your turntable set up with Ms Pinky, try playing anything OTHER than the Ms Pinky vinyl. The results will vary depending on the audio, and it's a different effect than regular analog scratching, but it's a lot of fun. Try a setup where a live instrument is feeding audio to MS Pinky and you'll notice that the audio files you are driving will follow the pitch contour of any melodies.

If you have two computers, try this on for size: set up one computer with BinkyToy set to respond to audio coming out of the second computer. Play audio files on the second computer in a program that has the ability to loop and change the pitch and speed of the audio. Hey, BinkyToy does that! It could very well be a second copy of BinkyToy on the second computer. You will notice that any pitch or speed changing on the second computer will produce corresponding effects in the audio files being driven (scratched) by BinkyToy on the first computer.

And taking that idea even further: make an audio file recording of the obnoxious Ms. Pinky signal playing straight and also doing some scratches. Put that file on your second computer and BinkyToy on the first computer will track to it; it doesn't really care if the Ms Pinky signal is coming from the vinyl or from an audio file...it sounds the same. Now if you loop the scratches and play with the pitch and speed of the playback on the second computer, you will get yet another unique effect from BinkyToy on the first computer. The audio file you are driving will not loop exactly, but the scratch will repeat exactly as the audio advances. It's as if you were able to perfectly perform the same scratch over and over and over again. Well, sort of.