Which to believe?

[Emma Raducanu]

I'm currently undergoing self-administered speech therapy, possibly not too disimilar to an aggregate of an elocution and tonal crashcourse.

At first I was recording myself using an HTC device, which uses AMR files. This is possibly what triggered my initial horror at hearing my own voice for the first time in ten years. So I began doing some field work, covertly recording my public encounters. I've listened back to myself ordering cups of tea, buying train tickets, showing an interest in a card game a couple next to me on the train were playing. All revealed a seemingly horrifying truth; that my voice is almost subhumanly shit.

Anyway recently while making bar graphs on my progress, I thought I'd log my recordings on to the computer. I converted the files from AMR to mp3 and began listening away.

Only this time, my voice sounds much improved. It is not so tonally low and dreadful, my intonation almost makes sense, my accent (which I can not detect, nor place geographically) no longer sounds quite so uncouth, though still rather uncultured. On ordering cups of tea, my 'public politeness' sounds sub lispy-pro-gay-wrestlery, to the point of being baffleing. Yet an MP3 conversion appears to be offering me some hope.

Has AMR duped me? Or could it be that (using headphones) listening to recordings on my HTC have given an unrepresentitive acount of my voice? Listening on the computer, I am hoping is a fairer, more true-to-life reproduction of reality. My voice definately sounds very different between the two mediums.

[surreal]

What is it about your voice that you don't like?  Everyone sounds different in their own head...

[Emma Raducanu]

The dichotomy between how I percieve my voice to sound and the apparant reality is so huge as to be confusing. Makes me realise why people who have no voice at all enter competitions like the X Factor.

Listening to myself in real life, I'd describe my voice as semi-well-spoken-northener-educated-but-probably-working-down-a-mine. Listening to recordings however, seem to reveal an extremely sub-Rocky Balboa mess. Also, the way I 'intonate' is irritating. You know you have people who end their sentences with a raised inflection, almost sounding like they're asking a question? I have the opposite of that and sound like I've just buried a relative.

[small_world]

Ah, yeah. I HATE my own voice.
I sound like a very nasally gay child. In my head it sounds fine, I've even been told that I have a nice telephone voice. But hearing it played back is very depressing.

[alan nagsworth]

I love my own voice. I often audio record my sexual encounters, listen back and arouse myself at will. I can also do that with recordings of myself getting frustrated with a fiddly item like a yoghurt lid with too much adhesive and no 'pull here' tab, or any times I am late for my bus and have to jog, muttering dissatisfiedly under my breath.

Make of my personal life what you will but remember that I will always have a sexy voice.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I will remember that now, yes.

I realised a few years ago my accent flits between northern/yorkshire and more sort of Correct Pronunciation, but can make me seem like I'm putting either/or of those on. This annoys me as I'm really doing it without trying. As for the actual sound of the fucker, sometimes it feels like I'm clenching my throat a bit while speaking. Other than that it's very nice indeed.

[El Unicornio, mang]

John Lennon, Robert Smith and Jimi Hendrix are three singers who all hated their own voices, so it's pretty common.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

In Robert Smith's case it was perfectly justified.*

*I can say this because I don't mind it got used to it.

[Hanslow]

I like my voice when I'm relaxed. A little croaky and definitely scouse. But of late I've been conscious that my voice changes when I'm on edge. It's probably me over-analysing each conversation I have in that environment, and looking to find fault somewhere. Still, I better not be talking funny infront of those people.

[massive bereavement]

My voice has a natural echo. I always get asked to turn my radio down when I call phone-in shows and there is nothing I can do about it.

[Johnny Yesno]

My voice has no echo and nobody knows why.

[babyshambler]

John Lennon, Robert Smith and Jimi Hendrix are three singers who all hated their own voices, so it's pretty common.

Roger Daltrey hates his too. It is strange when you hear yourself recorded though. My voice sounds deeper live.

[Big Jack McBastard]

I can do a frighteningly good Ray Romano, to the point where I can't detect any of my original inflections or mode of speech, could use it to utterly confuse people on the phone, but I've not had need of it yet.

I recorded myself singing the theme to The Boondocks in a flight of fancy a little while ago (testing my Blackometer) and found it quite odd, it's certainly not my voice, but not as accurate as it sounded in my head at the time.

It can be a revelation hearing yourself speak normally, usually if you're stuck in the face with s microphone 'a voice' comes over that isn't terribly representative you're almost playing disc-jockey to yourself the first few times you try.

When I hear my own accent, which comes off as 'riight oop narth' sometimes, (no 'H' in Hartlepool) I do occasionally cringe, I come off a bit monotone at times which is strange to me, I suppose my variations can be too subtle, they sound right when I say them but if they're not picked up I could easily come off as a miserable bastard which, while not being entirely inaccurate, is not something I'm keen on projecting too much.

If you've done any karaoke/Guitar Hero/Rock Band singing you'll quickly realize how off you are and try to compensate, but it can be bloody hard at times.

It should be compulsory for every X Factor wannabe to be subject to a pure recording of their own voice before they even try to enter. Not that it'd improve the result just so they face facts early rather than later.

[small_world]

John Lennon, Robert Smith and Jimi Hendrix are three singers who all hated their own voices, so it's pretty common.

Doesn't Thom Yorke also hate his voice[nb]life, house, car, wife, kids, razor blades[/nb]?

[Melodichaze]

I feel your pain, I cringe hearing my voice recordings played back...years of being a welsh speaker then living with Londoners means my accent is too muddled and pace too hurried to make sense to most folk.
I'm pretty happy with the tone and timbre of my voice generally (useful for work) but I should really work on the pace thing and projection :/

[buttgammon]

In my head, my voice is rich and sophisticated. On recordings, it is whiny, annoying and makes me sound like a particularly twatty hyperactive child. It's difficult to know whether these recordings are accurate or not really but the test is what someone who was being deadly honest thought you sounded like.

[Utter Shit]

I doubt there is anything that bad about your voice. On a scale of 1-10, having an annoying voice would be about a 1 or a 2 in the scheme of "things that would make you dislike a person". Recording and making bar graphs of your own voice would be about a 5 or a 6.