Not with a pitch black, but "back in the day" I've seen many balls suffer from a thing called core seperation.

 That is where the core comes loose from the cover material. And yes, it made the balls sound different, and gave them a "hollow" sound compared to the same ball that had not seperated.

 A guy here was VERY good at finding them. He would tap on the ball with his wedding ring, and the ones that had seperated gave him a distinct, dull, "clunk" sound.

 Might not be your problem, but it is possible.

I have had 3 or 4 balls do this in years past. If you don't like the hollow sound it makes but love the ball, the good news is that performance isn't affected and is no more likely to crack than any other ball.  I used one for a couple years after the core separated and the only difference was the sound. Still rolled and hit as good as ever.

I've had this happen in the past with a few balls (orange piranha and power torque) and if I rotated the ball back and forth in the correct direction I could actually feel the core moving slightly inside so in my opinion it could certainly affect performance of the ball.