Art by George Butler.
This episode was written and produced by Andrew Anderson and Casey Emmerling.
For our second annual Mystery Sound competition, we’ve rounded up the 20 best sounds from the past year, and invited the hosts of Underunderstood to test their ears in a competitive guessing game. So bust out those Q-tips, turn up your headphones, and prepare to guess along as we find out who will be the ultimate Mystery Sound Champion.
MUSIC FEATURED IN THIS EPISODE
I Know Reimagined by Brian Reith
Work by Cass XQ
Don’t Stop by Sonny Cleveland
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View Transcript ▶︎
You’re listening to Twenty Thousand Hertz.
[music in]
If you’re a regular listener, then you’re familiar with the Mystery Sound segment of our show. But if you’re not familiar: In the middle of each episode, we play a sound and ask you to write in and tell us what you think it is. Now, to be honest, this whole thing is just an excuse for us to engage with you, and drop in some interesting factoids about sounds that don’t necessarily need a full episode. Plus, anyone who guesses it right is entered to win a free super soft 20K T-shirt.
Now, once a year, we like to round up the best mystery sounds from the past 12 months into kind of a game show. It allows you to play along and catch up on any sounds you may have missed. It also gives me an opportunity to take a break from reading scripts, and be a little more casual and goofy. Most importantly though, it gives our team a well deserved break going into the busy holiday season.
Last year, I had on the McElroy brothers, from the podcast My Brother, My Brother, and Me. And this year, we’ve invited the hosts of another great podcast, called Underunderstood. That’s Billy, Adrianne, John and Regina. You’ll also hear from Casey, our supervising producer, who will be keeping score. So without further ado… here’s my friend Matt Baker, giving us the best game show announcer voice he could muster.
[music in]
Sound Extravaganza! In this heated competition, four opponents will compete to become the ultimate Mystery Sound champion.
The rules are simple: Each sound has a maximum score of three points. If the correct answer is guessed without any hints, the guesser will receive all three. If one hint is given, the guesser will receive two points. If two hints are given, the guesser will receive a single point.
Four players will enter, only one will emerge victorious. Let the games begin.
[music out]
Adrianne: Oh my gosh. There are points.
Adrianne: I remember this now from the McElroy episode.
So you are pitted against each other.
Adrianne: Pitting us against each other. Exactly.
Billy: And you mentioned Price Is Right earlier. So is it closest without going over in terms of the size of the object?
John: The price of licensing the sound.
Yeah. Basically we're making this whole thing up along the way.
Adrianne: It's Dallas rules.
Billy: Okay.
Adrianne: It's like Whose Line is it Anyway?
Pretty much. So yeah. Why don't we dive into it just to get it, get it going? All right… sound number one.
[sfx: The Legend of Zelda, A Link to the Past flute]
Adrianne: I feel like this is on a synthesizer keyboard where there are preset songs.
John: It sounds like a synthesized ocarina to me. So I'm going to guess it's Ocarina of Time.
Billy: I think they're trying to make us think that. It sounds very much like it's from Zelda or a video game like that, but I think it's something from the real world.
Adrianne: Like an elevator in Japan.
Billy: Yeah. They've designed the audible version of the crosswalk to be more pleasant.
Adrianne: Or a bidet.
Regina: I feel it's a microwave being done sound. It's like an electronic, “This is complete” type of notification.” [dog howl]
Adrianne: Regina just played her own mystery sound.
Regina: Yeah. I'm so sorry. My dog is very vocal.
[sfx: The Legend of Zelda, A Link to the Past flute]
John: My guess is it's something in the box, because I heard a little bit of digital ambience. So I'm going to stick with my Ocarina of Time guess.
Billy: I'm going to say it's a dryer unit, a washer or dryer unit indicating that it's done the cycle.
Regina: Yeah.
Adrianne: It's definitely like machine, singing to humans.
Hint number one, it is indeed from a video game and I'm going to go to hint number two. It is from a Super Nintendo game and you're awfully close.
Adrianne: So it's a Zelda.
It is a Zelda.
John: So it's A Link to the Past [sfx: correct].
There you go. That's it. It's the flute from A Link to the Past, which was my favorite game as a kid.
Regina: I feel a lot of people are probably really disappointed in us right now. I'm ashamed.
So basically it's the flute it's used to transform the weather vane in Kakariko Village into the flying duck and once you've awakened this flying duck, you can use the flute to call it and fast travel around Hyrule.
Billy: I think it's still possible that it’s playing on a bidet somewhere.
It's definitely possible.
Adrianne: Right, we could all be right.
Casey: Just to confirm, John you were the one who actually said A Link to the Past, right?
John: Yeah. Probably only by virtue of being fast.
So yeah. What's the score? That was kind of tricky, right off the bat, Casey.
Casey: We're going to go with one since we didn't get the actual title until we gave both hints.
Ok, so you’re stingy with those points.
Casey: Yeah. I'm taking this seriously.
Regina: As you should.
All right. Yeah. Let's keep going then. Sound number two.
[dog howl]
Regina: I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.
That is not it, but adorable.
Regina: I'm going to have to grab him. So just give me one second. So sorry.
All good.
Billy: You should definitely use this as a future mystery sound.
For sure.
Regina: Okay. Sorry, I'm back.
All right. So sound number two.
[sfx: Cheetah chirp]
Regina: Those sound like birds.
Billy: Now I think this one is a crosswalk.
John: No, it had crickets chirping in the back.
Regina: Yeah, it was very naturey.
Billy: Oh, sorry. They don't have crosswalks in the woods.
Well hint number one is that it's not a bird, but it is an animal that's native to Africa and central Iran.
Adrianne: Wow. That was a huge hint.
[sfx: cheetah chirp]
Regina: Is there an animal that's not technically a bird, but sounds like—you know, I feel like there's an animal that I'm thinking of that I can't quite name.
Adrianne: Like a Kiwi.
Regina: Sorry. That's what I meant. Technically not a bird, but everyone thinks of as a bird, like a tomato and vegetable situation.
Billy: What’s the tomato of birds?
I’ll go with hint number 2 here. So it's actually a big cat.
John: Oh wow. Is this a lynx?
It is not a lynx.
Well, I'll reveal this one because this is impossible. I couldn't get this when I first heard it, but what it is, is actually the chirp of a cheetah. Cheetahs chirp like this when they're excited, like when they're gathered around a kill. So it's adorable sounding. But I don't think I'd ever want to hear it.
Adrianne: Oh that is weird. Nature is so weird.
It is so weird. So cheetah mothers also chirp to call their cubs to them and they also purr like regular house cats too, which is adorable.
Arianne: Yeah. I'm wondering how they even mechanically make that sound.
Billy: And why does Chester Cheetah never make this noise?
That'd be a great sound for Cheetos.
Casey: You know what I love about Chester is that he is his own off brand, because there's Cheetos obviously, but then there's Chester's, which are their own product, but it's like the off brand of Cheeto.
It's like his contract negotiation was up.
Let's keep going. Let's go into sound number three here. So no points on that one, but somebody will get this one.
[sfx: Tesla Reverse]
Billy: Sounds like an electric vehicle of some sort to me.
That is a very good, good guess.
[sfx: Tesla backing up]
John: It was something recorded out in the real world, because there's mic handling happening. So the car's not moving I think. If it is a car.
Adrianne: I feel like John is cheating.
John: That's not cheating. That's using things in the sound!
Adrianne: John's using his bionic ears that he was born with.
So it is a noise meant to alert you of something, and it is from a car, a very popular car.
Adrianne: A very popular car. Sounds like a Tesla [sfx: correct].
That is a Tesla.
It's a Tesla Model 3. I don't know if all of the models do this, but it's a Tesla Model 3 backing up and it sounds like a spaceship when it goes [whooo].
Regina: That is really stressful.
John: What!? That's terrible.
Regina: I would hate that.
It also makes a noise when you're going forward and I think it's under 22 miles an hour. It just does a white noise sound out of the front.
John: That's probably a law thing. Right?
Right. So it's basically a safety issue. So if you have these cars that make no sound whatsoever, you're at a crosswalk or maybe somebody doesn't see you or something like that. It's just another sensory feedback just to let you know that the car's there.
Adrianne: I feel like the thing is that if I heard that noise, I would just stop and be like, “What is that noise?” and then would get hit by the Tesla.
Regina: Yeah. That seems right.
All right. Let's go into sound number four, we have 20 of them. So yeah, let's dive right in.
[sfx: Snow Monster]
Adrianne: This sounds like a clip from a movie.
Regina: Yeah, like a Star Wars type?
Billy: At the end, it's almost like a dog.
Adrianne: It’s like dogs barking at some monsters, yeah.
Regina: Jumanji.
[sfx: Snow Monster]
John: It's older than Jumanji.
Adrianne: Yeah, it sounds old.
It's from an animated movie. And I'll give you that and I'll give you the second hint too, because I think it's important. It's from an animated Christmas movie.
Billy: Oh, The Abominable Snowman? [sfx: correct]
Bam, there it is. So it's the Abominable Snow Monster also known as The Bumble from the old Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer claymation movie. One of the vocalizations from Abominable Snow Monster is also one of the classic sound effects from King Kong's roar [sfx: king kong].
Billy: Whoa. I was going to say King Kong.
It's basically sound effects being reused. So yeah. Now it's the Abominable Snow Monster.
All right. Sound number five.
[sfx: Tamagotchi]
Regina: It’s like a device looking for a signal.
John: This also feels like it's from a movie.
Regina: Yeah, definitely
Billy: The immediate thing that comes to mind is like old NOKIA phone.
It is a physical thing that you would put in your hand, but it's not a phone.
[sfx: Tamagotchi]
John: Is it a Tamagotchi? [sfx: correct]
You got it. Wow.
John: (Oh my God. Really?
Yeah. No hints on that one. That's 3 whole points.
John: Wow! No there was a hint. You said it's a physical thing.
That wasn’t part of the official—
Casey: It wasn't the official hint.
Yeah. I was basically saying you're getting warmer.
Adrianne: What!? There's some favoritism here. Ok.
So that is a Tamagotchi and it comes from a combination of Japanese words. One is egg, tamago. Forgive me, Japanese speakers, and the word for watch, which is Uatchi.
Adrian: I just remember wanting that thing for months and months, and then I got it and got bored with it in two days.
All right. Sound number six.
[sfx: manual credit card machine]
Regina: Cash register?
Regina: Oh, ATM dispensing money?
Both of those are very close.
Regina: Is it a bill counter?
It is not. I would say that this is very rare to see one of these nowadays. It does have something to do with a credit card.
[sfx: manual credit card machine]
John: Oh, it's the thing. It's the imprint thing that you slide over the card [sfx: correct]. What’s the name of that? I don’t know what it’s called.
A credit card imprinter. Which is a hand operated metal device that you put a credit card into, along with carbon paper and then you press down on the handle and slide it over the card and then the raised numbers put the imprint on the paper. That's how it works.
Adrianne: I like that one because it sounds like it would be really satisfying to do the action and get that sound [sfx: manual credit card machine].
Adrianne: Sounds nice.
Cool, why don't we keep going? Maybe this will be the one. So next sound.
[sfx: Hagrid Fire]
John: That was like three things in one. That was a hit from a trailer.
Regina: Was it a lawnmower starting?
Regina: You know, those old lawnmowers where you had to pull a cord to get it to start.
John: I think it's like two punches followed by someone falling off a building or something.
I will say it is from a movie that came out in the early 2000s.
It involves a character with a big beard, who is kind of magical.
John: The Santa Claus
Close.
John: The Santa Claus 2.
Billy: Santa Claus 3?
[sfx: Hagrid fire]
Adrianne: Harry Potter [sfx: correct].
*There you go. It's somebody and Harry Potter and I want to give you the point. So what that is, is the sound of Hagrid lighting a fire with his magic umbrella in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.**
Adrianne: I'm going to say, don't feel that bad about not getting that one, right.
So the story behind that is, so while working on the movie, the director told the supervising sound editor that he didn't want anything modern or futuristic or electronic for the spell sounds, and basically did not want Harry Potter to sound like Star Wars and so that's what motivated that sound.
Next sound. I think somebody will get this one.
[sfx: Bop It Loss]
Billy: Oh, I know this. Earthworm Jim.
Adrianne: What? Is it?
John: Yeah, it’s from Earthworm Jim.
It is not, but it's a game.
Regina: But you were so sure.
Adrianne: But it's a game.
Billy: You sure it wasn't reused in Earthworm Jim?
Potentially.
Adrianne: Billy, drop it.
[sfx: Bop It Loss]
John: (28:03) Is it from a Game Boy Advance game?
It is not. I can give you one hint though. Twist it.
John: Bop It.
Regina: Is it like a Bop It? [sfx: correct]
Dallas: There you go.
Regina: John got it first.
Dallas: That was only one hint.
Billy: Famously there was an Earthworm Jim inside of the Bop It. Everyone knows that.
Adrianne: Right. People forget about the Earthworm Jim inside the Bop It.
Dallas: So that's the sound the original Bop It made when you lose the game, the voice on the original voice version is from its inventor, Dan Klitsner and in the prototype that game over sound was him doing a Homer Simpson d’oh! Like [sfx: doh] sound? But they knew they couldn't license it. So they changed it to, Oww! [sfx: Bop It Loss]
Adrianne: It's a very tragic sound.
Okay, so what we’re gonna do now… Ok, just play it. I'm excited about this one though.
[sfx: Shredder]
So who is that character?
Billy: There's like a fly buzzing in the background or something.
Adrianne: So the voice sounds familiar, but I don't recognize the line.
John: Is this from Batman, the Animated Series?
It is not.
Adrianne: Is it from Dragon Ball Z?
It is not, but it is an animated TV show from the eighties. Maybe early nineties.
[sfx: Shredder]
John: Is it Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?
It is. It is from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
John: Is it Shredder? [sfx: correct]
It is Shredder.
John: Who played Shredder though?
So it's the same actor who played this person.
[sfx: Uncle Phil line]
Regina: Oh.
You recognize that voice?
Regina: Yeah.
John: Who is it?
Regina: I don't know. It's like a tip of my tongue situation.
Billy: Wait, can you play it again?
[sfx: Uncle Phil]
Billy: Uncle Phil from Fresh Prince [sfx: correct].
It's Uncle Phil from Fresh Prince, who's also Shredder in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles!
Billy: I had no idea!
Adrianne: I still don't know his name.
James Avery.
Casey: We'll give you a bonus point for that one, Billy.
Billy: Oh, thanks.
Okay. Sound 10.
[sfx: haunted mansion ride]
Adrianne: Movie. Old movie.
Regina: It's like a Hocus Pocus situation?
Adrianne: Ooh.
It is not.
Regina: Is it the original movie Witches? Not the remake?
It is not a movie.
Regina: A TV show.
It is not.
I'll go with hint number one, it involves 999 of something, but there's always room for one more.
[sfx: haunted mansion ride]
John: Oh! Oh! Is this the Haunted Mansion? [sfx: correct]
It is the Haunted Mansion from Disneyland.
Billy: Oooohh.
Adrianne: That’s a really good one.
So basically it’s that floating head inside a crystal ball that says a bunch of things throughout the ride.
Regina: Got it.
The person whose face they used was Disney Imagineer Leota Toombs, but the voice was actually dubbed over from actress named Eleanor Audley, who was the voice of Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty.
[sfx: Maleficent clip]
Alright. Cool. What's the score? I don't even know where we're at now.
Casey: Alright so Regina has none so far. Billy and Adrianne are both tied at 2 points each, and John has 12.
John: Oh man.
Casey: Why are you so good at this John?
Adrianne: I mean we knew that was going to happen.
Regina: Yeah, nobody's surprised.
Billy: He's the ears of the crew, you know?
John: I got lucky in that I used to subscribe to a bunch of theme park YouTube channels.
John: Oh, you got lucky that happened. Like that's some kind of accident, John.
[music in]
Announcer: The Twenty Thousand Hertz Mystery Sound Extravaganza will return after these messages.
[music out]
MIDROLL
[music in]
Announcer: We now return to the 2nd annual Twenty Thousand Hertz Mystery Sound Extravaganza.
[music out]
Let's keep going though. Sound 11.
[sfx: Goro]
Regina: Can I just keep guessing Star Wars eventually it'll be right?
Adrianne: I feel like it's another Disneyland ride.
Billy: It’s a music hit with the roar. Which I feel like is a very TV show thing to do.
John: But the roar is like really low quality and the hit is not.
Adrianne: Wow. That's mean John.
I sound designed that. So I'm a little offended, but okay.
John: Oh no. I'm never going to be invited back.
[laugh] I did not sound design this.
Adrianne: Sorry. Can we hear it again?
[sfx: Goro]
Billy: There's a helicopter. It sounds like.
So I’ll give a hint, because we are not warm on this one.
So it is from a videogame that's been released multiple times and I'm going to give you the second hint too. This character has four arms.
Adrianne: Mortal Kombat.
I'm going to call it.
And I'm going to give that point because there's no reason why you should keep this name tucked away in your brain.
Adrianne: Is it Prince Goro? [sfx: correct]
Well, yeah! That’s who it is. I didn’t even know he was a prince. Is Goro a prince because we're going to have to add a point if that's the case, because that's not even in my notes here.
Adrianne: I'm pretty sure he's a prince. He’s a prince in the movie.
Casey: I think he might be. I'm on the Wikipedia page.
Billy: [laughing] Where do they have the royalty credentials in the Wikipedia page?
Casey: Oh yeah yeah yeah. Goro is a strong but sophisticated prince of the Sho Khan race.
Adrianne: Yes!
Look at that. You got to get at least two points for that.
Casey: I'm going to give you a bonus point on that one.
Adrianne: I'm going to need them. Thank you.
So we do have some opportunity here for someone to gain some three points real quick right now on this next sound so get ready because here it comes.
[sfx: Lost Title Card]
John: Lost. [sfx: correct]
There you go.
Billy: I would've got it!
So Lost intro... that theme was composed by J.J Abrams, one of the show's creators. And as far as I’m aware, almost all of the shows that J.J Abrams has produced or created like Fringe and those, he did the theme songs and I suspect because the theme songs actually make the most money in royalties. So it would make sense that if you want to make tons of royalty money, write the theme song.
Billy: Oh that's interesting.
Regina: I love that. Yep.
We're about to find out where you all are from, if you guess the next one correct.
[sfx: The Hockey Theme]
Adrianne: Is this a regional advertisement?
Billy: I'm thinking regional news theme.
Close.
Adrianne: Sounds more like entertainment.
Regina: The weather?
Does have to do with sports, but there was a small chance that someone here might be Canadian. Is anyone Canadian?
Adrianne: No.
There's no way anybody's going to get it then, because when we posted this on the show, every Canadian that listens to the show knew exactly what it was immediately and I didn't know what it was.
Adrianne: Can we phone a Canadian?
God that'd be so good.
John: You said this has to do with sports.
Sports.
John: So it’s gotta be hockey, right?
Adrianne: So it's a hockey.
So I think every Canadian would get that, but I'll go ahead and reveal it because there are no Canadians. But that's the beginning of the hockey theme, which has been used by the Canadian sports networks for over 50 years. Most famously it was used in the CBC Hockey Night in Canada up until 2008.
Adrianne: This is like if someone is in the other room and they hear the hockey sound, come on, then they know it's time.
Right. [sfx: Hockey Theme]
All right. Let's play the next sound.
[sfx: Au Clair de la Lune]
John: I think I know what it is.
John: I think it's a wax cylinder.
Adrianne: It sounds like women singing into a very Lo-Fi recording instrument.
Billy: It's very melancholy.
John: Is this the first recording ever made? [sfx: correct]
It is the earliest recognizable recording of a human. So I would call that a point. Don't you think Casey?
Casey: Sure, yeah.
The song is almost impossible to even make out, but basically it is Au Clair de la Lune, which was recorded on an old fashioned device called a phonautograph and it was recorded in 1860, which makes it the earliest recognizable recording of a human voice.
John: Wow.
Adrianne: That's wild.
Casey, I'll let you dole out the points.
Casey: Well, we didn't give any of the actual hints that we had. So I suppose that it's three points.
John: I don't think I actually got it.
Billy: He doesn't need it, come on.
John: I asked a bunch of questions that were like “Is... yeah.”
Billy: Yeah. I feel like that should almost be negative points.
Casey: Okay, so what's fair. One point? Alright I'm doing one, because you didn't guess the song, so we'll do one.
John: Yeah.
Okay. Let's keep going. Next one. Sound number 15.
[sfx: Metal Gear Codec]
Adrianne: Is this the Codec in Metal Gear Solid? [sfx: correct]
What? That is exactly the codec from Metal Gear Solid.
Adrianne: I don't know some sounds you just memorize for life I guess.
Wow.
Adrianne: I played that game a lot and then actually my husband is playing it right now. So it was fresh in my mind.
Billy: Like as we speak?
Adrianne: Possibly.
That's very impressive. Okay. Well how about the next one?
[sfx: Kangling]
Adrianne: A couple of people playing shofars?
Regina: I was going to say shofar.
It is not.
Adrianne: I don't know, but I feel like it's being played first thing in the morning, it's like a call to prayer in the morning.
Regina: Or in mourning, like if something sad happened.
That's a good guess, I think. But I will say it's an instrument from Tibet and it is made from something that I think we all have.
Billy: Regrets.
Adrianne: Human bone. [sfx: correct]
So you did get that. It is a bone instrument from a human.
Adrianne: Wait, human bone really?
Yeah.
Regina: Oh my gosh.
What human bones could you make an instrument out of?
Regina: Like a femur?
Yeah. Wouldn't that be it? That is a femur. Isn't it Casey? Now that I'm looking at it.
Casey: Uhh thigh bone.
I think a thigh bone is the femur though. Isn't it?
Regina: I know the femur is in the leg. I think it is the thigh bone, but also I'm a little biased because I would love a point here.
Casey: Yeah. Your thigh bone (femur) is the longest and strongest bone in the body. Yeah. You got thighbone. We'll definitely give you a point for that. [sfx: correct]
Adrianne: Nice
So it's the sound of a kangling, which is a horn used in certain Tibetan, Buddhist rituals Cong ling's are traditionally made from human thigh bones. So that's what your thigh bone sounds like after it's dried out and I buzzed into. [sfx: Kangling]
Adrianne: Very resonant.
Billy: By the way, Regina is by far the most morbid of our crew. So it's totally fitting that she would get the bone related question.
Adrianne: Death or TikTok, that's Regina’s categories.
Billy: She has that tattooed on her back actually.
Regina: TikTok or die.
We are all the way up to sound number 17 of 20.
[sfx: Star Trek door]
Adrianne: Is this obscene?
Billy: Obscene?
We are a very PG show. So there's no Obscene.
John: What could be….?
[sfx: Star Trek door]
John: Ohh it had a little chirp in there.
Regina: Yeah. Was like a Angry Birds thing?
Adrianne: Is it a balloon?
John: We're going to need a hint I think.
It's one of the most classic sound effects in television history.
Billy: Classic in that it's used a lot or classic in that it has an iconic use?
In this particular show. Yeah. So these are other sounds featured in this show too and I think we have two of them. So maybe we'll dance around it.
[sfx: klaxon & food drink synthesizer]
Adrianne: Oh, Twilight Zone.
No.
Casey: Close.
Regina: X-Files?
Casey: Closer in era to the Twilight Zone, the original series.
Billy: Star Trek? [sfx: correct]
There you go. Can you pick out what it is in the Starship Enterprise here?
[sfx: Star Trek door]
Adrianne: Is it the doors? [sfx: correct]
It's the sliding doors. So that's the sound of the sliding doors on the Starship Enterprise from the original series.
Casey: I'm going to give a point each to Billy and Adrianne for Star Trek and the doors.
Adrianne: Cool.
Billy: Ok, great.
Okay, there is almost no chance this next one will be guessed, but it's a very cool story, I think.
[sfx: Mars Rover]
Adrianne: Umm.
Regina: It’s like a UFO landing.
Oooh umm I would say...
Casey: Not far off.
Not far off.
John: Is this a field recording of something?
It is. It’s very remote. I would say it's very very remote.
John: Is this in Area 51 or something?
Adrianne: I thought that part of the sound was a heartbeat, but it sounds like it's just some other kind of low frequency.
John: It's like wind.
Adrianne: Interference.
Okay. So I will say the recording was made last year and it's maybe the most profound recording since recording existed, I might go that far.
Adrianne: What!? Okay. You have to let us guess at this one for a little while.
[sfx: Mars Rover]
Billy: This is the room noise when Mark Zuckerberg announced Facebook would now be known as Meta.
Adrianne: Okay, but it's not something in space because space doesn't make a sound. So… it’s something that was recorded for the first time, probably. And it's something really remote, something at the bottom of the sea?
It's the very first recording of where this is.
John: Is it Mars? [sfx: correct]
It is Mars.
Adrianne: Oh, okay.
The very first audio recording captured on Mars and it was recorded by the Perseverance Rover, and they took a mic along… but the atmospheric pressure is so low that it would be a very thin sound anyway, but this recording is basically five mile an hour winds blowing across the Martian surface and as well as the sound of the Rover itself.
Adrianne: That’s cool
Billy: Wow.
John: What is the speed of sound on Mars?
[Dallas Laughs nervously]
Adrianne: Yeah. Turn it around. How do you like being on the spot?
I feel like I'm being challenged right now.
John: I'm looking it up because it's got to be different. Right?
So it's very cold. I can't remember if it slows down in cold.
Adrianne: What is the speed of sound on earth?
John: Speed of sound on earth is 760 miles per hour. On Mars it's 540 miles per hour. The density of Mars’s atmosphere is a hundred times less than Earth, so sound is softer there.
Billy: So it's going to be harder to pull off massive concerts there when we colonize it.
Adrianne: It's ASMR planet.
Regina: Budget that in.
All right where are—we are—ok… I’m not gonna signpost. Here's sound number 19.
[sfx: Snail chewing]
Adrianne: Sounds like rain.
Billy: Sounds like butter on toast.
John: Sounds like ice?
It is not ice.
Billy: Yeah. Can you go again?
[sfx: snail chewing]
Regina: It's like walking on snow.
Adrianne: I feel like it’s like rain on an animal breaking out of an eggshell.
I will say that this is a small animal and this had to be recorded like very close up and turned way up to hear it.
Adrianne: It like something coming out of a chrysalis? Like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly.
That would sound probably very similar, but I will say that this animal is an animal and it's slimy.
Adrianne: Snake coming out of an egg?
Billy: Oh, it's something digesting something.
It's eating. Small, slimy and eating.
Billy: Chester the Cheetah.
I don’t think that this is gonna happen.
Billy: A slug?
Close, yeah!
Billy: A slug eating its lover?
Billy: What do slugs eat? I don't know.
John: Their lovers, yeah.
Regina: Exclusively their lovers, yeah.
Adrianne: A snail eating a piece of lettuce [sfx: correct].
What? Are you in my mystery sound show document here? It is literally a snail chowing down on a piece of lettuce.
Adrianne: I just know they like lettuce.
Wow. Well, it was a team at the BBC Earth Lab recorded this snail in an anechoic chamber, which is one of those chambers that have no sound in it, with a super ultrasensitive microphone.
John: And it's still that noisy.
It’s still that noisy.
Adrianne: John is the person who would go in an anechoic chamber and be like, it's a little resonant.
Regina: Can you get closer to the mic please?
Billy: He's still poo-pooing their work. They probably spent months trying to get this snail to eat lettuce under the perfect conditions. And you’re like “Ehhh. Room noise.”
John: No what I'm saying is it's so quiet. Someone was able to pick it up. Nevermind.
Regina: It's okay.
We only have one sound left here.
Adrianne: What are the point totals before we go into the final Q?
Casey: Final round Billy three, Adrianne nine. John...
Adrianne: Gosh, can you even count that high?
Casey: 17.
Casey: Regina one.
I will say that this would be great if anybody got this.
[sfx: Mummy Voice]
John: Oh, I know what this is! This is the mummy! Yeah. Yeah. Wait, this is the recreation of the sound of a mummy that was done last year, right? [sfx: correct]
It actually was.
Adrianne: Is it? Yeah.
Billy: John mapped this on his, his OP-1 keyboard and made a song out of it.
John: I did.
I guess there's no reason to do any of these hints. So hint number one, I thought was pretty clever, which is it's not a recording of a living thing, which was kind of turning it sideways, because it is technically not living. Hint number two was, if you're going to go up against one of these, you should get Brendan Fraser's help and you got it right off the bat.
John: Oh god I feel like I ruined your...
Adrianne: No, that's great. You should send Dallas your song, John.
Billy: It was Yummy by Justin Bieber, [music clip: Yummy clip] but made with the mummy. [music clip: mummy song clip]
That’s amazing.
So that was the recreated voice of an Egyptian mummy named Nesyamun. So researchers in England made that sound by reproducing his mouth and vocal tract with a 3D printer. The researcher said it isn't a totally accurate representation partially because his tongue had dried out and shrunk over 3,000 years. So the recreated tongue is much smaller than it would have been.
John: Also he probably never did that utterance.
Of course not in any point of my life have I ever just gone? Eh.
Casey: I’m pretty sure that means “I love you” in ancient Egyptian.
Billy: I think it's the sound I'm going to make when I hear the point totals at the end of this.
[mummy voice & imitations]
Casey: So we got Regina at one point, Billy at three points, Adrianne at nine points, and John at 20 points.
[sfx: triumphant horn fanfare]
Adrianne: John, you're going to have to come back for the tournament of champions.
You were the Ken Jennings of the Mystery Sound Show. I can't remember who won last year.
John: Yeah, am I in a beef with a McElroy right now?
We're going to have to find out.
Casey: Ooh, final round, like next round?
Yeah! That's what we should do. Like a tournament of champions, eventually.
Adrianne: A bracket, right.
Yeah. Okay. Well that's all of our show, but
[music in]
I guess the one thing that I like to ask people at the end of our interviews is what's your favorite sound in the world?
John: I like, in our… For about like three weeks in our backyard. There's really good crickets. Like we get really good thick cricket sounds for like three or four weeks at the end of the summer, and I love that.
Billy: That's your answer? Thick crickets.
Regina: Two C's.
Casey: Yeah. That's how you spell it too. C R I C C E T
Announcer: This concludes the 2nd Annual Twenty Thousand Hertz Mystery Sound Extravaganza! Thanks for playing!
Twenty Thousand Hertz is hosted by me, Dallas Taylor, and produced by the people at Defacto Sound. To find out more, visit Defacto Sound dot com.
This episode was produced by Casey Emmerling and Andrew Anderson, with help from Sam Rinebold. It was sound designed and mixed by Soren Begin. It was sound designed and mixed by Justin Hollis.
Announcer: Game show announcer voice by Matt K. Baker.
A huge thanks goes to the Underunderstood crew for joining us on this episode. Over on their show, Regina, John, Adrianne and Billy try to find answers to questions that the internet can’t answer... It’s constantly surprising and hilarious. So go subscribe to Underunderstood, right here in your podcast player.
And from all of us here at Twenty Thousand Hertz, happy holidays, and we’ll be back next month. If you need a little more 20K while we’re gone, then head over to our website, 20K dot org. For each of our episodes, you can check out additional content, get a list of the music tracks we used, and see the incredible custom artwork that we commission for each show. The art for this episode is especially fun once you know what all of the mystery sounds are. So go check it out.
Thanks for listening.
[music out]
