Is it possible to bust the Gary Sudbrink case with voice matching?

Mickey

New Member
Hey guys I am a long time lurker, bringing my first case to see if you might be able to bust it.

I know I'm supposed to embed things for you to read but I'm not quite sure how to do it. So I'm going to list a link to a YouTube channel that recently summarized the case and I'll include a short description as well.

To sum it up, in the 1990s, a Air Force captain named Gary Subrink was on vacation with his family when he received what he claims are four extremely unusual phones calls. He says he recorded them on his answering machine which means we can listen to them today.

They are definitely weird.. extremely low pitched and slow and unnatural.. and they make extremely strange statements like "look at Orion when the sun rises on the dark side of the Moon":)

As a result UFO folks think this is proof of some type of alien contact.

He claims the calls came in conjunction with a number of weird personal events.. somebody claimed to be him and called a close friend and while traveling to meet his family, strange people tried to interview him and learn his name.

The first aspect of this case is easily debunked... It's simply a pre-recorded tape that's been slowed down.. there are multiple indicators that this is true and I had a cassette player like this in that time frame so I know it's possible.

So debunkers have already brought the recording back up to speed, and big surprise, the voice sounds very much like the Air Force captain who reported this case... A young male with a light New Jersey accent.

My hypothesis is he recorded the weird phrases and had a friend call his parents house and the friend played the track back at low speed.

With that said, I wonder if anybody in the metabunk community has the skill set to sample Gary Subrink and the mysterious voice and then compare them?

I'm an audio engineer and sampling is incredibly simple, but I do not have access or experience using whatever software would be necessary to match voices.

The link to one of many Hocus pocus style videos follow.. it's funny to see that they've either bought in hook line and sinker or just think this is a great story, which frankly it is :-)

Any and all thoughts.


Source: https://youtu.be/CBB_oJMRSA8?si=z89Lwyo5nVA2_7RZ
 
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Hey guys I am a long time lurker

Then you will be familiar with my abrupt tone.

If you care about details, then perhaps you could get his name right - and it wasn't a typo as you made the mistake more than once.

If you don't care about details, then this thread doesn't need to exist.

Which is it?
 
The link is broken — you put a hard return in the middle of it. Please fix that, too.

I think the caller just held a cloth over the receiver microphone ;)
 
Hello everyone and thanks for the fast feedback.

FatPhil, I would be happy to edit the name, however, I don't see an edit option... Is it possible I don't have authorization yet? Or please point me to the right button.

Landru, thanks for fixing the link.

Edward Current, the voice is muffled, especially when it gets quiet, but there is something else going on as well.. it turns out that there's lots of videos on this story and one of them literally recorded the voice onto a tape recorder, played it back at twice speed and voila, you hear a normal voice with a light New Jersey accent.

So I think it would be interesting to see if the affected voice is the same as Gary Subrink.
 
I'm an audio engineer

Sounds like you're more qualified to work with recordings and voices then most of us.

OK, so 4:00 into this video and I'm having the same problem with every other source for this story. Where the hell is the primary source? This video is just the host yacking and retelling the intro to the story about Subrink supposedly meeting some strangers at the airport and supposedly not telling his buddy he was coming home but his buddy knew he really was coming home, yadda, yadda. The host gives no source for any of this, nor it seems does any other mention of this story on other podcast, paranormal/UFO websites or reddit. They all just seem to be reading or dramatizing from a central script that they don't share.

At around 5:00 we get a recorded call with Subrink talking to the alien voice on the other end. It's just 3 phrases EDIT: 4 phrases: "Hello", "Is Garry Sub-Subrink there?" "How long are you going to be back from Texas" and "You're being impersonated by the other voice", that just repeat regardless of what Subrink says or asks.

As has been pointed out, this is a recorded voice that has been slowed down via a cassette recorder and seems to only consist of these 3 phrases. Honestly, this is straight up Home Alone 2, where Kevin uses his Talkboy recorder to perform this same trick. Supposedly Subrink claims this happened in February of 1993, and Home Alone 2 had come out in fall of 1992. This is juvenile. People really think this is an alien talking?!
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104431/

I'm not sure I want to devote anymore time to this particular video. Is there any primary source, like Subrink himself, for any of this? For right now all of the mysterious things that supposedly happened are just here say. And that assumes Subrink isn't part of the hoax, which is certainly a possibility.

Other content on this lady's channel includes various mystery mongering topics like "giants", things "they" don't want you to know and the equally dubious claim of 16,000 people disappearing in Alaska:

1735511798769.png


The missing people in Alaska came up in another thread, where it was more like 22,000, but regardless, there was no reliable source for these numbers, just roundabout references to a dubious History Channel TV show. But I get the idea this host isn't overly concerned with evidence.

Alaska missing people here (post #38):
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/cl...on-the-dark-side-of-the-moon-or-alaska.13504/
 
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Yeah I don't think it's worth any more of our time. Bottom-of-the-barrel stuff.

It might be worthwhile, though, to discuss where that line is — what is and what isn't worth crowdsourcing's time, and how that might be determined.
 
Thanks for the responses..

I may have not made it clear, I believe this is a hoax.. I totally agree that the channels where this shows up are full of nonsense.

What I was hoping to do is to prove beyond a matter of doubt that it is a hoax by matching the voice of the perpetrator to the affected voice.

That may not be of any interest to you guys but figured it wouldn't hurt too ask.

As far as the doubt of my audio credentials, that seems like a pretty rude approach to meeting somebody new... But to make you happy:

First four track cassette in high school.. studied recording and radio in college and recorded every band in the town... Produced commercials and industrial film as an audio post producer for 10 years. Director of marketing and specs developer for one of the first DAW manufacturers. 30 years of front of house, recording and room design. Currently a music teacher on multiple DAWs including pro tools, cubase, Ableton, reaper and any other platform that a student needs to learn.

Back to the the big picture, I assumed that you guys would have fun making a simple bust but sorry to bother you and I'll go back to lurking.

Cheers,
M
 
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At the 8:40 creepy
First four track cassette in high school.. studied recording and radio in college and recorded every band in the town... Produced commercials and industrial film as an audio post producer for 10 years. Director of marketing and specs developer for one of the first DAW manufacturers. 30 years of front of house, recording and room design. Currently a music teacher on multiple DAWs including pro tools, cubase, Ableton, reaper and any other platform that a student needs to learn.

Which again, if the voice can be matched, it seems you're the guy to do it. And to be clear, I wasn't suggesting that you thought this was legit or real, more that people like this lady keep repeating it and the folks on reddit seem to eat it up.

I let the video run while out in my shop, and to be fair(ish) the host does point out that the voice was slowed down and that this is the same trick Kevin pulls in Home Alone 2 but ultimately uses other hear say anecdotes to maintain it's still "creepy" and mysterious, which seems to be her schtick.

Back to the the big picture, I assumed that you guys would have fun making a simple bust but sorry to bother you and I'll go back to lurking.

Stick around, it's fun!
 
Thanks NorCal but I'm not a forensic audio engineer..

Of course software has changed radically... We used to do noise reduction that required many manual passes and a lot of horsepower and these are now available as inexpensive, fast plugins.

There are dedicated software packages for voice matching... But I don't have any experience with them and I was hoping somebody here might have experience and access.
 
FatPhil, I would be happy to edit the name, however, I don't see an edit option... Is it possible I don't have authorization yet? Or please point me to the right button.
It's my understanding that the edit option is not available for new posters (in order to avoid spam) but it should appear to you after a few entries. But there will be a limited window of time (not sure exactly how long) after each post before the edit feature gets locked again.

For example, this is how this very post appears to me:
Forum edit feature.png
 
Thanks NorCal but I'm not a forensic audio engineer..
I doubt that any of us are.

I am guessing voice matching would entail isolating phonemes, do an audio spectrum analysis on them, and compare. It would help to have them both say the same words, and to use some other voices as controls.
 
I doubt that any of us are.

I am guessing voice matching would entail isolating phonemes, do an audio spectrum analysis on them, and compare. It would help to have them both say the same words, and to use some other voices as controls.
From the little bit that I know, you're absolutely right.. every vocal track has slightly different dimensions, which impacts the way that overtones are generated, which means that every voice ends up with a relatively unique "fingerprint".

There are dedicated apps that do the comparisons and I had imagined that metabunk members may have access.. from the little I know about video, it seems like you guys have the parallel video skills and technology and I was hoping I might learn something close to my heart as well.

It was too much going on in my world right now to chase this down, but who knows if I get a break sometime I might go after this one again and let you guys know.

Thanks again for the feedback!
 
From the little bit that I know, you're absolutely right.. every vocal track has slightly different dimensions, which impacts the way that overtones are generated, which means that every voice ends up with a relatively unique "fingerprint".

There are dedicated apps that do the comparisons and I had imagined that metabunk members may have access.. from the little I know about video, it seems like you guys have the parallel video skills and technology and I was hoping I might learn something close to my heart as well.
Perhaps try "cepstrum" analysis in Audacity, which is a Free/Open-Source program:
External Quote:
Cepstrum: The cepstrum of an audio signal is related to the spectrum, but presents the rate of change in the different spectrum bands. It's particularly useful for properties of vocal tracks and is used, for example, in software to identify speakers by their voice characteristics.
-- https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/plot_spectrum.html

It also has a spectrogram display:
image

via: https://support.audacityteam.org/audio-analysis/spectral-analysis
 
Perhaps try "cepstrum" analysis in Audacity, which is a Free/Open-Source program:
External Quote:
Cepstrum: The cepstrum of an audio signal is related to the spectrum, but presents the rate of change in the different spectrum bands. It's particularly useful for properties of vocal tracks and is used, for example, in software to identify speakers by their voice characteristics.
-- https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/plot_spectrum.html
Thank you! Audacity is free and easy so maybe I'm going to have to make the time.
 
Hey guys I am a long time lurker, bringing my first case to see if you might be able to bust it.

I know I'm supposed to embed things for you to read but I'm not quite sure how to do it. So I'm going to list a link to a YouTube channel that recently summarized the case and I'll include a short description as well.

To sum it up, in the 1990s, a Air Force captain named Gary Subrink was on vacation with his family when he received what he claims are four extremely unusual phones calls. He says he recorded them on his answering machine which means we can listen to them today.

They are definitely weird.. extremely low pitched and slow and unnatural.. and they make extremely strange statements like "look at Orion when the sun rises on the dark side of the Moon":)

As a result UFO folks think this is proof of some type of alien contact.

He claims the calls came in conjunction with a number of weird personal events.. somebody claimed to be him and called a close friend and while traveling to meet his family, strange people tried to interview him and learn his name.

The first aspect of this case is easily debunked... It's simply a pre-recorded tape that's been slowed down.. there are multiple indicators that this is true and I had a cassette player like this in that time frame so I know it's possible.

So debunkers have already brought the recording back up to speed, and big surprise, the voice sounds very much like the Air Force captain who reported this case... A young male with a light New Jersey accent.

My hypothesis is he recorded the weird phrases and had a friend call his parents house and the friend played the track back at low speed.

With that said, I wonder if anybody in the metabunk community has the skill set to sample Gary Subrink and the mysterious voice and then compare them?

I'm an audio engineer and sampling is incredibly simple, but I do not have access or experience using whatever software would be necessary to match voices.

The link to one of many Hocus pocus style videos follow.. it's funny to see that they've either bought in hook line and sinker or just think this is a great story, which frankly it is :-)

Any and all thoughts.


Source: https://youtu.be/CBB_oJMRSA8?si=z89Lwyo5nVA2_7RZ


I have been a State forensic expert in Brazil for over ten years, and although I have spent the majority of this time doing mostly crime scene and some other forensic tasks, I was recently ( as in a few months ago) moved to the digital forensics section, where we do everything audio, video, image and digital-document related.

So far, I have only taken one case of speaker identification. Although I'm still a novice at this, I did go through a good amount of training. What I can tell you about it is this:
  1. It's very complex, extremely time-consuming.
  2. You need a large sample of the "questioned" voice in order to extract any sort of speaker profile. Anything under a minute or so will likely not give you enough information for an analysis.
  3. You also need a large, actually a much larger, sample of the "reference", as in the suspect's, voice in order to extract this speaker profile.
  4. These samples should be of around the same time, because speech patterns change, voices change as we grow older.
  5. Audio quality matters. Noisy audio will give you less reliable results.
  6. Even in close to "optimal" conditions, a competent expert will only give you a "it's very likely that these two voices come from the same person" and not a 100% answer.

I haven't even watched the video, but from the comments it sounds like it's sound from a cheap tape recorder, played through its speaker into a phone, gone through a landline (which filters out anything above about 4kHz, not a big problem, but you do lose some information), then recorded again to tape by the answering machine. And at some point this old tape was converted into a digital file. We can assume this last step was well done. Still, doesn't give me much hope.

You say the tape was sped down. By how much exactly? This number will determine what frequencies you'll end up with after you speed it back up. Even if every equipment with a speed change feature had only one rate of change, surely not all them achieved that same exact amount of change of the playback speed. So I think this is an absolute non starter.

I think we should stick to other lines of investigation here.
 
Any and all thoughts.

You get an unsolicited 'phone call from a creepy voice- I think the majority of people would just hang up (maybe after a quick "f*** off"). Even if it's a practical joke from a friend it's misguided and potentially upsetting.

After a second crank call, maybe buy a good whistle and leave it by the phone, perhaps inform the phone company.
What's the point of entering into a dialogue? He's not tracing the call.
If Sudbrink's account is accurate, he's received some crank calls. These can be strange and unpleasant, but (particularly when landlines carried most calls) hardly rare.

If Sudbrink believed the caller, who asked for him by name, had information about him (including location, phone number) that couldn't have been acquired by prosaic means it might have been appropriate to inform his commanding officer, who could liaise with those responsible for personal security (PERSEC) for their unit.

Why Sudbrink felt compelled to enter into conversation with the caller must be questioned. It all feels a bit John Keel.
I'm not good with accents, but the caller's voice in the video sounded to me like it shared some features of Sudbrink's voice.
 
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Okay got to the video. The way the caller keeps repeating the exact same nonsense lines, in the same order, with the same intonation, is enough to know that this was a recording. It sounds sped down, but whatever. It's a prank.
 
I have been a State forensic expert in Brazil for over ten years, and although I have spent the majority of this time doing mostly crime scene and some other forensic tasks, I was recently ( as in a few months ago) moved to the digital forensics section, where we do everything audio, video, image and digital-document related.

So far, I have only taken one case of speaker identification. Although I'm still a novice at this, I did go through a good amount of training. What I can tell you about it is this:
  1. It's very complex, extremely time-consuming.
  2. You need a large sample of the "questioned" voice in order to extract any sort of speaker profile. Anything under a minute or so will likely not give you enough information for an analysis.
  3. You also need a large, actually a much larger, sample of the "reference", as in the suspect's, voice in order to extract this speaker profile.
  4. These samples should be of around the same time, because speech patterns change, voices change as we grow older.
  5. Audio quality matters. Noisy audio will give you less reliable results.
  6. Even in close to "optimal" conditions, a competent expert will only give you a "it's very likely that these two voices come from the same person" and not a 100% answer.

I haven't even watched the video, but from the comments it sounds like it's sound from a cheap tape recorder, played through its speaker into a phone, gone through a landline (which filters out anything above about 4kHz, not a big problem, but you do lose some information), then recorded again to tape by the answering machine. And at some point this old tape was converted into a digital file. We can assume this last step was well done. Still, doesn't give me much hope.

You say the tape was sped down. By how much exactly? This number will determine what frequencies you'll end up with after you speed it back up. Even if every equipment with a speed change feature had only one rate of change, surely not all them achieved that same exact amount of change of the playback speed. So I think this is an absolute non starter.

I think we should stick to other lines of investigation here.
Thanks Gaspa... Now I'm back in the I think this is more than I know how to do camp :-)

Apparently it was slowed down to half speed, and having had a tape recorder with that capability at the time, I do you know that the speed is approximate.. so just simply doubling it probably wouldn't work as you mentioned.
 
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You get an unsolicited 'phone call from a creepy voice- I think the majority of people would just hang up (maybe after a quick "f*** off"). Even if it's a practical joke from a friend it's misguided and potentially upsetting.

After a second crank call, maybe buy a good whistle and leave it by the phone, perhaps inform the phone company.
What's the point of entering into a dialogue? He's not tracing the call.
If Subrink's account is accurate, he's received some crank calls. These can be strange and unpleasant, but (particularly when landlines carried most calls) hardly rare.

If Subrink believed the caller, who asked for him by name, had information about him (including location, phone number) that couldn't have been acquired by prosaic means it might have been appropriate to inform his commanding officer, who could liaise with those responsible for personal security (PERSEC) for their unit.

Why Subrink felt compelled to enter into conversation with the caller must be questioned. It all feels a bit John Keel.
I'm not good with accents, but the caller's voice in the video sounded to me like it shared some features of Subrink's voice.
It's starting to sound like voice matching is unlikely, but you nailed the reasons that I'm almost certain that Subrink is involved.

Other than the call itself, we have to depend on Subrink for all the other weird stuff.. people trying to interview him and sitting with him on the plane trying to get background information...

And of course his friend who said he had received a fake call from Subrink, could simply be a story that Subrink made up or planted.

So good old Occam, all of the weird stuff goes away if he did it.
 
Okay got to the video. The way the caller keeps repeating the exact same nonsense lines, in the same order, with the same intonation, is enough to know that this was a recording. It sounds sped down, but whatever. It's a prank.

Yeah, most everyone here agrees it's a prank or hoax, including Mickey who originally posted it. I think he just thought it would be fun if someone could show, using software, that maybe Subrink was not only the victim but also the guy that made the recordings.

IF Subrink is in on the hoax, he would have needed an accomplice. Someone has to be on the other line fiddling with the recorder or possibly a sampler, to play the pre-recorded bits.
 
There are transcripts of Sudbrink's received calls on the NORMAL + PARANORMAL website (not my usual reading matter), in an article written by Justin Bamforth, "Creepy Calls from a Strange Entity";
https://normalparanormal.org/2019/04/02/creepy-calls-from-a-strange-entity/.
I haven't rigorously checked to see if it matches the recording, but it seems to be OK.

Bamford says Capt. Sudbrink was "...assigned to medical pharmacy work" for the USAF in San Antonio, but it's not clear if he was an actual pharmacist. Sudbrink had gone to visit family and friends in Long Island; part of the story is that he hadn't told anyone where he was going. Maybe this is a little unusual- many of us might tell friends or colleagues if we were going away somewhere, and I'm surprised he didn't check that his parents would be home- but it's not massively strange I suppose.

It's unlikely Sudbrink travelled incognito, and sometimes blameless people are "stalked" by troubled or unreasonable persons who can be persistent and surprisingly successful at gathering information about their "quarry".

There was an immediate prequal to the 1st of the 4 strange phone calls:
External Quote:

At his parents' house in New York, Gary placed a call to his longtime friend, Mike. But Mike relayed how he had already spoken with Gary by phone the day before, describing how Gary had just flown in through LaGuardia airport (although Gary had actually come in through JFK), along with the impression that he was coming down with a cold (even though Gary was perfectly healthy at the time).
As a result, Mike decided not to hang out with him, which left Gary quite confused. As the two of them conversed, another call came in through call waiting.
In the context of the subsequent calls this might seem peculiar, but by itself there isn't much of note.
It might be a bit unusual for a (presumably) relatively young, healthy man to forget he 'phoned his friend the day before, but maybe Sudbrink had been working hard in the run-up to his break. Maybe he'd been drinking en route, or did have a bit of a cold. Or all three. Maybe he mentioned the wrong airport.
But Mike deciding not to meet up with Gary Sudbrink on the basis of the disputed phone call seems odd behaviour for an adult; I suspect either things didn't happen quite as related, or there's "background" to the Gary-Mike friendship we're unaware of.


External Quote:

Call #1 – Monday, Feb. 08, 1993, 10:30 pm
Duration: 3 minutes, 46 seconds



GARY: I'll tell you who it is.
VOICE: Hello?

GARY: Yeah. Do you want to speak to him?

VOICE: Is Gary Sud–Sudbrink there?
GARY: Yeah, who's this? Steven? Are you playing games with me or what?

GARY: Huh? Steven if you're playing games here, I'm going to kick your ass.

VOICE: So how long are you going to be back from Texas?
GARY: Huh?

VOICE: You're being impersonated by the other voice.
GARY: Yeah this is you Steven—you idiot. You're pissing me off. Jerk. I'm gonna get you on…let's see what it says. Review. One new call. Out of area? Is Steven out of the area?

VOICE (interrupts): How long are you going to be back from Texas?
GARY: Wait, say that again.

VOICE: You're being impersonated by the other voice.
GARY: Wait, hold on. Is Steven out of the calling area or what?

MOM: How do I know?
GARY: What do you mean, you don't know? He's in Queens.
DAD: Well who are you talking to?
GARY: I don't know who the f*** I'm talking to…

VOICE (interrupts): Hello?
MOM: Hello?

VOICE: Is Gary Sud–Sudbrink there?

MOM: Who is this?
GARY (in background): Let me talk to him.

MOM: Somebody sounds like a robot.

GARY: Hello?
VOICE: How long are you going to be back from Texas?
GARY: What was that again, sir?

VOICE: You're being impersonated by the other voice.
GARY (to family): Oh be quiet—else, eh? Sorry, will you say that again?
GARY: Hello? I'm being impersonated by what voice?

VOICE: Hello?
GARY: Yeah. Hello?

VOICE: Is Gary Sud–Sudbrink there?
GARY: Yeah, hold on a second.
MOM: Who is that?
GARY: It's Steven. Okay. Yeah what is your question? I'll answer it.

DAD (in background): …a strange voice.
VOICE: So how long are you going to be back from Texas?
GARY: How long–
VOICE (interrupts): You're being impersonated by the other voice.
GARY: Right. When am I coming back? Is that your question?

VOICE (quieter voice): Sudbrink there?
DAD (in background): What's a matter with you?
GARY: Okay there was a break, hold on. You wanna know when I'm coming back to Texas. Uh, is that your question?

VOICE: So how long are you going to be back from Texas?
GARY: How long am I going to be back from Texas…
VOICE (interrupts): You're being impersonated by the other voice.
GARY (talking overtop): …that question doesn't even make any sense.

GARY: Okay. I'll be coming back eventually. Um…I can't tell you when. You should know that question—the answer to the question because you seem to know more about me than I do. You know what I'm saying?

DAD: Are you a…intergalactic…uh…person?

GARY: Are you a space alien?
DAD: Sounds like he hung up.

GARY: I can't believe this.
DAD: It's—he hung up Gary.

GARY: See if he comes back.
DAD: Alright, I'll hang up.

(**Dial tone.**)

GARY: Jesus Christ. Oh my God man. I'm calling Mike back.
Sudbrink seems to hang on to the idea that it might be a prank call from his (older) brother Steven for quite some time, and his initial responses, based on this belief, seem quite hostile- not, e.g., "Very funny, Steven. How are you?"
As with Mike, maybe there is more to the Gary-Steven relationship that might be relevant.

Bamforth again, in NORMAL + PARANORMAL,
External Quote:

...there was a separate strange occurrence, which happened to involve both Steven and Gary a few years prior to the strange phone call.
While en route to a wedding (also in Long Island) Steven saw Gary [Sudbrink] drive up alongside him, make some weird faces to get his attention, and then just simply drive off.
Even though Gary was in Long Island at that time, he didn't have a car to drive, let alone the make and model he was apparently spotted in—the same exact one that had been parked at Gary's residence in San Antonio!
If I read this right, Gary Sudbrink did have a car, of exactly the type Steven claimed he saw, but Gary Sudbrink claimed it was in San Antonio at the time.
Five initial possibilities come to mind:

(1) Some mysterious paranormal force created a doppelgänger of G. Sudbrink and his car, for the purpose of mildly annoying older brother Steven.
(2) People who know Gary Sudbrink well sometimes mistake other people for him/ hallucinate him (Steven: Gary driving his car, Mike: the disputed phone call).
(3) Gary Sudbrink sometimes played pranks on others that involved an element of, ahem, misdirection/ misrepresentation.
(4) Gary Sudbrink is the victim of pranks/ subject of interesting but improbable accounts, possibly devised by brother Steven and/or friend Mike.
(5) Any combination of Gary/ Steven/ Mike, together or separately, are fond of not-very-funny "practical jokes"/ creating interesting narratives.

We know that possibilities (2)-(5) are possible (this doesn't mean that any necessarily apply to Gary Sudbrink/ Steven/ Mike), though (2) seems unlikely. Possibility (1) is... problematic.

Note that after the mystery caller says "Hello" 3 times, "Is Gary Sud-Sudbrink there?" 3 times, "Sudbrink there?" once,
and five lots of "So how long are you going to be back from Texas?... ...You're being impersonated by the other voice",
but absolutely nothing else,
the Sudbrinks ask

External Quote:

DAD: Are you a…intergalactic…uh…person?

GARY: Are you a space alien?
Now, the voice does sound strange, the repeated questions about how long Gary is staying in Long Island are poor telephone etiquette and maybe intrusive, and "You're being impersonated by the other voice" would be an odd, maybe unsettling thing for most of us to hear from a stranger.
But what would make either Gary Sudbrink or his father question whether this was an extraterrestrial?

(Might look at the rest of the transcript in the next couple of days but would be grateful if someone beats me to it!)
 
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Now, the voice does sound strange, the repeated questions about going back to Texas are poor telephone etiquette and maybe intrusive, and "You're being impersonated by the other voice" would be an odd, maybe unsettling thing for most of us to hear from a stranger.
But what would make either Gary Sudbrink or his father question whether this was an extraterre

While listening to the rest of the OP video, which seems to just rehash other sources, she makes mention of Sudbrink's father having had a UFO encounter and being big into the UFO scene, hence the thought that the voice was alien. Maybe?
Five initial possibilities come to mind:

Assuming any of this is true, as it's all 2nd here-say it appears, possibility #6 could be, his brother saw a similar car and the driver either resembled his brother, or being that it was a similar car, he remembered the driver resembling his brother enough to create the encounter.
 
Thanks for bringing up the Dad UFO thing.. I think it may be key.

Again, the simplest solution would be Sudbrink hoaxing everything because then none of the stories need to be cooberated. All he would need is a friend playing a tape recorder over the phone and the rest of it could simply be backstory created to make it look like he was the victim instead of the perpetrator.

But somewhere along the way, I also read that the father had a UFO experience in West Virginia and the father seems to reference this in the phone call.. because he had a previous experience he believed that an alien was trying to contact him.

And maybe that's the whole ball of wax? Maybe Sudbrink created the hoax to make fun of his father... Who knows if an hour before he left town he said "Dad that was all fun wasn't it?Just messing with you..." But maybe the father had already shared the tapes etc..

Or maybe this achieved a life of its own so fast that he would been embarrassed to let his Father know that he had faked it.

Someone earlier in the thread asked why didn't he just hang up the phone. I think that's what 99% of the people would have done if they didn't have an alternative reason to want this conversation to continue.

Thanks for all the input! Without voice matching potential I think we've covered this one pretty good!
 
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Can people here be a little nicer to first time posters? Some of the earliest responses were unnecessarily abrasive, especially when it seemed like OP came here in good faith.

@Mickey I hope you stick around!
Thanks Yoshy.

It turned out to be fun and I especially appreciate Gaspa letting us know what is and isn't possible with voice matching.
 
One could potentially use something like Nvidia's TitaNet AI model for speaker identification/verification for this.

https://huggingface.co/nvidia/speakerverification_en_titanet_large

It can of course be downloaded and used locally, but there are some public spaces using it where it can be tried out, e.g.,

https://huggingface.co/spaces/nithinraok/titanet-speaker-verification (click the "Upload File" tab at the top to upload two audio files for comparison).

I'm not sure how accurate the results this model produces are, and it doesn't really seem worth the effort of isolating and resampling the slowed down audio sections to try and compare them.
 
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