How to Edit Strange Sound on Voice

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

Windows 10, Audacity Version 2.4.2

I’ve been recording a 90 yo’s audiobook for which I’ve provided a dropbox link for a short sample. It might be my dumbo guitar player ears, but I hear a strange sound on the back end of her voice that I have no idea how to edit out. It expands and contracts with her words and phrases. It’s not an echo. It’s not a reverb. I built a near soundproofed enclosed hut to use for recording, so it’s not room noise. And, if I use the same mic with my own voice, I don’t get the same effect. In the guitar world, I’d have to use a flanger effect pedal to get something close. Is there a word for this? Can you hear it too? Can I fix it in Audacity somehow and remove it?

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cl4x7944ffwzl0c/martytest.mp3?dl=0

2

It is “compression artifacts”. It’s a side effect of file compression (reduced file size) when using “lossy” compression formats such as MP3.
Unfortunately there is no effective remedy.

You can create it yourself as an experiment:

  1. Start with a high quality voice recording in Audacity.
  2. Export as a WAV file - this is your “control sample” for comparison purposes.
  3. Export as an MP3 and set the following MP3 options (MP3 Export Options - Audacity Manual)
  • Bit Rate mode = Constant
  • Quality = 16kbps

Notice that the MP3 file is MUCH smaller than the WAV file.
Observe that the sound quality of the MP3 is rather bad.