The human voice is a diverse and varied instrument, and we often use certain inflections to convey a specific emotion. Consequently, when we are especially angered, we tend to either heighten our voices into shouting, or tense up our voices, in which case they sound coarser than usual.
Often times in fiction, this kind of coarseness tends to be used as a defining timbre of voice for characters who are The Cynic, have a Hair-Trigger Temper, are Hot-Blooded, prone to fits of Angrish or are the Grumpy Old Man (in which case they're also a Scratchy-Voiced Senior). This is especially prevalent in animated media, where a raspy quality in the voice can be used more freely as a short-hand way of describing a character's temperament, without being taken as Narm.
Not to be confused with Angry Animalistic Growl, which denotes a one-off instance of a character's voice getting coarse as a response to extreme provocation, though there can be overlap, for obvious reasons.
Compare Evil Sounds Raspy, where a coarse voice is used on a villain; Smoky Voice, where the voice sounds coarse and raspy due to abuse from smoking; and Harsh Vocals, the closest equivalent this trope has in music.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba: Inosuke Hashibira, the Wild Child member of the main trio, is an exuberant, temperamental, and hot-headed Demon hunter who has a coarse, raspy voice that fits both his demeanor and his boar-like headdress.
- Lupin III:
- Daisuke Jigen, the resident Sarcastic Devotee of Lupin's gang. His voice comes across as this at times, particularly in the specials before Kiyoshi Kobayashi retired from the role in 2021 (having voiced Jigen since 1969). Kobayashi's successor Akio Ōtsuka carries on the trend.
- The Hot-Blooded Inspector Zenigata has the roughest voice in the cast, courtesy of Gorō Naya's Smoky Voice. Naya's successor Kōichi Yamadera gives Zenigata an even coarser voice.
- My Hero Academia: The angry, rageful Katsuki Bakugo, as portrayed by Nobuhiko Okamoto (Clifford Chapin in English), has a very coarse, raspy voice to match his personality. In fact, you'll be hard-pressed to find a single scene where his voice sounds even close to normal.
Comic Books
- Batman: Batman has a fairly noticeable deep, slightly raspy voice when on a case/mission. His most-known voice actor, the late Kevin Conroy, famously voiced the character with a casual, average voice for Bruce and a deep, gravelly one for the Bat.
- Wolverine: Wolverine has been known for this since Cal Dodd portrayed him in X-Men: The Animated Series. This was more pronounced in the comics during the time he had gone more feral thanks to Genesis failing to rebond him with adamantium, his speech bubbles taking a more jagged look.
Fan Fiction
- The Dragon and the Butterfly: Valentina is a worldly woman who likes fighting and is tough as nails (which is why it's a bit of a surprise for everyone when she and Bruno fall in love). Her Establishing Character Moment shows her as having a raspy voice. Downplayed, though, in that she mainly acts tough and violent because, for her, that's the only way to survive. Once she learns that she doesn't need to fight for survival in the Encanto, she loosens up and shows herself to be a very loving (in her own way) woman.
Films — Animation
- Dinosaur: Bruton, Kron's cantankerous and rough second-in-command, has a notably coarse, raspy voice.
- The Lion King: Banzai, the most aggressive and trigger-happy of the three hyenas, is played with the raspiest voice.
- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: Grumpy the Dwarf has the roughest personality of the Dwarfs. He's also got a fairly raspy voice.
Films — Live-Action
- The Hobbit:
- Dwalin, the rowdiest and most aggressive of the Company, speaks with a low, gruff voice coupled with an equally brash Scottish accent.
- Beorn the skin-changer, first introduced in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, speaks with a low, raspy voice with a prominent growl (which could double as an Animal Species Accent, seeing as he can turn into a massive black bear), and his backstory here gives him an Adaptational Angst Upgrade, seeing as he's the Last of His Kind after the other skin-changers were killed, enslaved and tortured by Azog the Defiler. Because of this, Beorn is very stand-offish, and he doesn't like Dwarves any more than Orcs, which is why the Company have to introduce themselves to him one by one, so that he doesn't get overwhelmed and lash out at them.
- Spider-Man Trilogy: J. Jonah Jameson, Peter's cantankerous boss at the Daily Bugle, is played by J. K. Simmons, an actor known for his gravelly, gruff voice, who puts it to very good effect for this trope.
Live-Action TV
- Star Trek:
- Star Trek: The Original Series: Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy has a slightly raspy voice and, despite being a dedicated, talented doctor, often snarks at his patients, the captain, the enemy... If it speaks, he's snarked at it. Repeatedly.
- This trope also applies to the Ferengi of TNG, as they speak in high-pitched yet raspy voices, and are known to be a race of sexist, unpleasant, greedy con artists/shrewd businessmen.
- Captain Liam Shaw from season 3 of Star Trek: Picard has a gruff voice, a world-weary demeanor, and a noticeable dislike of Admiral Picard. It's then revealed that he was a survivor of the Battle of Wolf 359 — which left him with massive Survivor Guilt — and he still sees Picard as Locutus of Borg.
- Trailer Park Boys: Jim Lahey is a Crass Canuck, and a mean, cynical, vicious old alcoholic, and the late John Dunsworth portrayed him with a faint liquor-induced rasp to his voice (which became more prominent as he aged). His rasping becomes more prominent when he's threatening the Boys, either through whispering warnings to Bubbles about the "winds of shit", or when he's openly raging at Ricky for interacting with his daughter Treena:
Lahey: You've crossed the line this time, you little bastard! (subjects Ricky to an Angry Collar Grab) How DARE you involve my daughter in your HEMISPHERE OF SHIT?!
Video Games
- Cranky villagers in Animal Crossing notably have deep-pitched Animalese throughout the entire series. Joan, an elderly turnip seller, also notably received a unique Animalese pitch in early games. Some special characters (Notably Booker, Brewster, and Wilbur) use the Cranky voice.
- Final Fantasy XV: Gladiolus, the grumpiest of the quartet, has a deep, gravelly voice.
- League of Legends features Ornn, the Fire Below the Mountain, a powerful, yet reclusive demigod of the forge who prefers to stay away from civilization. He's consequently not very talkative, but when he does speak — usually to deliver some dry snark and grumble about the humans bothering him while he's working — his voice is very deep and rumbling, akin to a Grumpy Old Man.
- Metal Gear Solid: Solid Snake has a distinctive gruff voice, partially due to being a heavy smoker, and is the most pessimistic out of the playable characters, and the least tolerant of non-box related nonsense.
- Mortal Kombat 1: Sub-Zero, AKA Bi-Han, is the grandmaster of the Lin Kuei and is characterized as an aggressive, callous individual, with a deep and raspy voice to match.
- Yakuza 0: Daisaku Kuze, one of the Dojima Family lieutenants who pursues the protagonist Kazuma Kiryu throughout the game, is also the most openly aggressive of the three. He also happens to have a Smoky Voice to fit his temperament.
Western Animation
- Bob's Burgers: Mrs. LaBonz the grouchy Apathetic Teacher has a very rough voice in her later appearancesnote , which is justified, as she is frequently seen smoking.
- Ed, Edd n Eddy: Eddy is the angriest, most rageful member of the titular trio, and he happens to be the one who has the coarsest voice of them.
- Goof Troop: Pete, as portrayed by Jim Cummings, has a low, gruff voice to go hand in hand with his irritable, crass personality.
- Gravity Falls: Grunkle Stan. Alex Hirsch set the grifter/con man apart from the other characters he voices (i.e. Soos, Old Man McGuckit, Bill Cipher, etc) by giving him a short temper, cynical outlook on life, and a guttural, raspy voice.
- Hazbin Hotel: Husk, the hotel's grumpy and cynical bartender, initially had a gravelly voice. However, later in the first season his voice actor Keith David switched to giving him a much smoother, sonorous voice as he became something of a confidant for the others.
- The Mr. Men Show: This is common among the Mr. Men and Little Misses with negative personality traits, such as Mr. Grumpy, Mr. Stubborn, and Miss Bossy.
- Phineas and Ferb: Buford the bully (although he got a lot of Character Development over the show's run) has the shortest fuse of his friend group and often does things to torment or prank his friends (with Baljeet being his most common target). His voice is noticeably raspy, which is something he actually takes pride in.
Buford: You need to scream in a closet for hours to get it this way. Hours!
- The Powerpuff Girls (1998): Buttercup has the raspiest voice of the trio (courtesy of E.G. Daily, who did a similarly raspy voice for Tommy), and she's a short-tempered Blood Knight.
- Rugrats:
- Grandpa Lou can get cantankerous and snarky, and his voice is quite gruff. His voice became higher-pitched when Joe Alaskey voiced him, but he went back to sounding rough later on.
- Boris is very argumentative and complainy, and he has a raspy voice with a Yiddish accent.
- The Simpsons: Abe Simpson the Grumpy Old Man can be even crabbier than his son Homer, and he has a rather scratchy voice.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Most depictions of Raphael give him the deepest, raspiest voice of the Turtles (most notably in the 2003 series, which also gave him a Brooklyn accent). The same arguably goes for Casey Jones, whose temper rivals Raph's (although his voice, depending on the incarnation, is usually not as deep as the turtle's).
- Transformers: Animated: Ratchet is very much this trope, with him having the shortest fuse of the Autobots (rivaled only by Bumblebee) and a raspy voice with a slight Southern accent. That said, he's clearly a Jerk with a Heart of Gold who cares about his Autobot crew, and it's revealed partway through season one that a lot of his anger comes from the traumas he faced as a field medic during the war on Cybertron.
