question for the brits

i often hear a particular accent on the bbc, but i'm not sure what part of the u.k. the speakers are from.

it's the same accent that gareth on "the office" speaks with.

can someone enlighten me?

Kind of a midlands twang... LOL i guess 'Wolverhampton-y' would be right...

...by our standards, a bit of a nothing accent, rarely imitated either in flattery or derision, compared to things like Brummie, Manc, Scouse, Geordie or Devon...

Does that help?

Perhaps a bit Bristol / South West too.

Gareth's webpage doesn't mention where he is from.

Yeah, good point. i'm in Bristol every couple months... that slight twang
that hovers on the edge of the voice... i know what you mean.

It's a little bit west country I thought, Bristol sounds about right to me.

Bristol it is then.

I'm so sure i said it twice.

[Edited on Feb 14, 2005 by TheReverend]

So would that be the British equivalent of the Midwestern accent in the US?

We were just discussing something like this at a party the other night. The conversation was about how so many very different accents could all come from such a small group of islands.

I remember when I was in London, my neighbor was from Newcastle. It took a few weeks for my flatmate and I to understand her! (And she us, of course.)

That made me laugh out loud.

The trickiest accent to understand (for me anyway) is either Geordie or Scottish accents. Man, i can't understand a word they say!!