Driving a 697-horsepower, V8-powered SUV reminded me what's missing from electric cars

• I tested a 2023 Aston Martin DBX707 SUV and remembered the biggest thing missing in electric cars.
• EVs are fast and fun, but they lack engine noise that amps up the driving experience.

I never thought I'd be that person on the internet lamenting the death of combustion engines. My reporting tends to focus on the tidal wave of cool electric vehicles headed our way. And as a person concerned about the planet's future, I know EVs are part of our ticket out of this mess we've created.

So what has compelled me to gush about the Aston Martin DBX707, an SUV that gets a wasteful 17 miles to the gallon? Well, I drove one, and it was really fun.

EVs are eerily quiet and stupendously quick, a combination that's entertaining but gets kind of old after a while. Slam the accelerator in almost any new electric car, SUV, or truck — yes, truck — and you'll instantly and effortlessly blast off into the distance like a missile.

Heck, in this weird, new electric world, there's a Kia that hits 60 mph in a mere 3.4 seconds.

That's just the magic of electric motors. They've democratized speed.

Driving the DBX707 for a week reminded me that no matter how breathtakingly fast EVs get, there's something crucial missing from the experience of driving them: sound.

You can barely tell if an EV is even on from the driver's seat. There's no such confusion in the DBX707. Upon start, its 697-horsepower, turbocharged V8 engine barks out a throaty growl, letting everyone in the parking lot know you mean business.

Every time I'd floor it, like on a highway onramp, for example, a low rumble would swell into a thunderous, cabin-filling roar as the SUV gathered speed and shifted gears. The noise and vibrations of thousands of perfectly timed explosions lent some drama to the experience you don't get with battery power.

In an EV, there's zero buildup; just press the throttle and "whee!" In a high-performance gas car like the DBX707, the buildup is part of the thrill.

A souped-up version of Aston Martin's DBX SUV, the DBX707 had other things going for it, too.

The $276,000 (as-tested) SUV delivered on its eye-watering price tag with an elegant leather interior, head-turning style, adjustable suspension, and sports car-like handling. My biggest gripe: The Aston's clunky, touchscreen-less infotainment system was way too dated for a vehicle worth a quarter-million bucks.

Car companies are working on the sound issue. EVs typically pipe an artificial acceleration noise into their cabins to mimic the ambiance of conventional cars.

Sometimes, the soundscape calls to mind a gasoline engine. Other times, it's a more UFO-like drone. Often, I find the synthetic noise intolerable and try to switch it off.

A few carmakers are taking things a step further. The (all-electric) Hyundai Ioniq 5 N will blast screaming engine noises both inside and outside the vehicle, while also imitating the sound of gear shifts. Dodge, renowned for selling muscle cars that can wake an entire neighborhood, unveiled an electric prototype with a phony exhaust that rivals the volume of a jet engine.

The Pininfarina Battista, a 1,900-horsepower electric supercar, growls at passersby and actually vibrates to the touch as if it had a gas engine under the hood.

Figuring out the right sound profile for future EVs will probably be most important for brands like Lamborghini, whose customers have come to expect big, loud engines. In something like a Rolls-Royce (which just launched its first EV, by the way), silence is exactly what buyers are looking for. For your average car buyer, too, quiet is a luxury.

But are fake vroom vroom noises the way to hardcore car enthusiasts' hearts? I'm not so sure. Ed Kim, chief analyst at the consulting firm AutoPacific, agrees, telling me recently that they're likely just a fad.

"I don't know that 10 years from now we'll still be seeing this," he said. "In the end, I think many drivers seek an experience that's authentic and real."