Infinitely Losing My Edge
Yeah, I'm losing my edge.
I'm losing my edge.
The kids are coming up from behind.
I'm losing my edge.
I'm losing my edge to the kids from Haiti and from Bremen.
But I was there.
I was there in 1970.
I was there at the first Onyeabor show in Enugu.
I'm losing my edge.
I'm losing my edge to the kids whose footsteps I hear when they get on the decks.
I'm losing my edge to the internet seekers who can tell me every member of every good group from 1963 to 1972.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Johannesburg and Stockholm.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Bologna kids in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered nineties.
I'm losing my edge.
I'm losing my edge.
I can hear the footsteps every night on the decks.
But I was there.
I was there in 1965 at the first Beefheart practice in a loft in Lancaster.
I was working on the linndrum sounds with much patience.
I was there when Captain Beefheart started up his first band.
I told him, "Don't do it that way. You'll never make a dime."
I was there.
I was the first guy playing Swell Maps to the grunge kids.
I played it at the Astoria.
Everybody thought I was crazy.
We all know.
I was there.
I was there.
I've never been wrong.
But I'm losing my edge to better-looking people with better ideas and more talent.
And they're actually really, really nice.
I'm losing my edge.
I heard you have a compilation of every good song ever done by anybody.
Every great song by The Pretty Things. All the underground hits.
All Ponytail tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every The Cowsills record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal electroclash hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '70s cut and another box set from the '90s.
I hear you're buying an arpeggiator and a güiro and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Lalann record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your 808 and bought an organ.
I hear that you and your band have sold your organ and bought a 808.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Bob Dylan,
Section 25,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
Mars,
Cymande,
The Standells,
U.S. Maple,
Sonic Youth,
Scientists,
Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks,
Johnny Osbourne,
The Move,
Robert Wyatt,
The Stooges,
Sugar Minott,
The United States of America,
Magazine,
Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth,
The Zeros,
The Human League,
the Germs,
Cheater Slicks,
Aaron Thompson,
The Music Machine,
Sticky Fingaz feat. Raekwon,
Dorothy Ashby,
Black Bananas,
Sun Ra,
The Peanut Butter Conspiracy,
Flamin' Groovies,
Jeru the Damaja,
Traffic Nightmare,
Gang Starr,
Ajijia Myrayebe,
The Gun Club,
Rosa Yemen,
Alphaville,
The Star Department,
Red Lorry Yellow Lorry,
Harmonia,
Girls At Our Best!,
Faraquet,
Pierre Henry,
Bauhaus,
T. Rex,
Al Stewart,
The New Christs,
Boz Scaggs,
New Age Steppers,
Pulsallama,
David Bowie,
ABC,
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band,
Isaac Hayes,
Barclay James Harvest,
Avey Tare,
Neil Young,
Oppenheimer Analysis,
Andrew Hill,
Dennis Brown,
The Victims,
Bobby Byrd, Bobby Byrd, Bobby Byrd, Bobby Byrd.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.
You don't know what you really want.