All about us monstrous wheels were turning slowly; machinery was clanking and groaning in the
hoarsest discords; invisible waters were pouring onward with a rushing sound; high above our heads, on skeleton platforms, iron chains clattered fast and fiercely over iron pulleys, and huge steam pumps puffed and gasped, and slowly raised and depressed their heavy black beams of wood.
He played guitar like Jimi Hendrix and wrote melodies like the Beatles; in his remarkably nimble voice you could hear echoes of guttural James Brown, silken Al Green and John Lennon, in his
hoarsest primal-cream mode.
The voice that had once so effectively taunted "pointyheaded pseudo-intellectuals who can't park their bicycles straight" was gone now, replaced by the
hoarsest of whispers; disease had gnawed away at his throat.