American sounds very gruff, abrupt and round take on the language.
Sounds far more aggressive than it has to be, imo.
The same can be said about the regional english accents...
I mean Liverpudlians sounds like whiney lil children to me,
Mancunians sound like they have a perminant cold and seems to use a 22letter alphabet rather than 26letter...
and cockney londers... i swear they only have 10 letters in thier and believe if they speak faster and laugh at most things they say like it's a joke we'll understand them.
(most don't seem to realise we're laughin AT them not WITH them)
Although the Americans have a variety, it is all very much the same basic accent which to me sound quite devonshire or atleast quite rural crossed with irish.
It's alot easier to mimic most american (and canadian) accents than it is to get Scottish, Bolton or Welsh right.
This said the stereotypical english accent is a very very rare thing to actually hear.
Something that always made me laugh was Californians. They'd be like 'Oh we don't have accents, it's like we're very neutral.'
which just cracked me up because there's several accents they have across Cali, and more over theirs is a very district stereotypical american accent.
Perhaps because most TV Actors happen to have it.