Jon's Speaking Voice
 

Since I'm a farily new member of this board this may have been posted elsewhere ... sorry if it is. I've been curious about something for a while and that thead about bad improvisations caused it to pop up in my head again. There seems to be (in my ear anyway) a major difference in Jon's speaking voice on stage and when he's doing interviews, press conferences, movies and what not. It seems that when he speaks or banters into the microphone on stage he comes off as having a strong Jersey accent (Mind you I'm from Canada so it may be another accent ... can't say for sure) while that doesn't come through at all when he speaks in an interview. In fact if I didn't actually see Jon talking I wouldn't know that it's the same person from stage voice to interview voice. Does anyone else notice this and if so do you know if he does this for a perfomance feature or if it helps to soothe his voice between songs or some other reason?

I've noticed it before, but I don't know if its a performance feature. Perhaps in interviews Jon is trying to mask his accent.

Kinda related, but I had a teacher in high school from Newfoundland and he worked at masking his accent. There were a few phrases and words where it was blatently clear, and you would also hear it when he was tired. Other times, unless you were told, you'd never guess that this teacher was from the Rock.

I've noticed on stage that he often has an accent on stage--and it sounds more like a Southern accent than a Jersey accent. If you've ever heard him speaking from 1984 interviews or even during shows, he had a really strong Jersey accent. But it definitely changed over the years. It's really quite common for singers and actors to take speech lessons to get rid of their accents. It's better for marketing to be able to be more easily understood--don't speak too fast; don't speak too slow; watch your intonation...

Oh, maybe he is trying to mask it so he's not labeled as having a specific accent. Since I wasn't born in 84, I believe you!

I always just thought that he was more comfortable in concert, and was just speaking like he would with friends. I thought that when giving interviews, he thought maybe he should clean up his speech a bit.

I find it odd that quite a major selling point of the band is that they are from New Jersey, yet he masks his accent ..... ?

it might just not come out all the time

my roommate's from the same area of Jersey and her accent gets really strong when she gets more emotional or has to talk louder

I've always thought it sounded Southern too. He seems to turn it on and off though. A really good example is in KTF An Evening With...~ I can hear it now in my mind. Right before they do the last song (KTF) he's talking about the new album and Tico's maracas. Then he goes into the "Southern accent" mode when he's like "And in case i forgot to say it, if I don't see ya again thanx for coming, we'll see you out on the road.." it is VERY noticeable.

I remember Howard Stern and Robin Quivers used to often make fun of Jon's Southern accent that he only has on stage..

Really? I never knew that!!

It's not really a SELLING point that they're from New Jersey. I mean, it's not like New Jersey is an exotic location and Jersey accents aren't really known for being sexy or anything. LOL It's not a selling point for anyone to come across as too tied to one area or the country. Think about how many people say they hate country music because they assume everyone sings with a "twang."

It's not a selling point that they come from NJ? They have an album named after it! And every single article ever written about them refers to them as "the New Jersey rockers" or whatever. I think its a pretty big selling point

I bet I could find lots of things to say about Tico's maracas, given the opportunity. Heh.

Sorry. Anyway:

I always just assumed the southern-sounding accent was an embellishment until I met my roommate, her accent is really southern sounding sometimes. I think it's just that area of Jersey. Not that I'm an expert or anything.