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 Korea North and from Lagos.
But I was there.
I was there in 1979.
I was there at the first Second Layer show in South London.
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 1967 to 1975.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Beijing and Tehran.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school New York 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 1983 at the first Bronski Beat practice in a loft in Brixton.
I was working on the arpeggiator sounds with much patience.
I was there when Lou Reed 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 Sticky Fingaz feat. Raekwon to the disco kids.
I played it at the Crocodile.
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 Scott Walker. All the underground hits.
All a-ha tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Ultramagnetic MC's record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal rap hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '50s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying an arpeggiator and a spring reverb and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Procol Harum record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your theremin and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought a theremin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Gories,
Echospace,
Crash Course in Science,
The Modern Lovers,
A Certain Ratio,
Fifty Foot Hose,
Public Enemy,
David Bowie,
Gichy Dan,
Quando Quango,
The Blackbyrds,
La Düsseldorf,
The Music Machine,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
Robert Wyatt,
Von Mondo,
Leonard Cohen,
Camberwell Now,
Surgeon,
The Barracudas,
T. Rex,
Lucky Dragons,
Slave,
Girls At Our Best!,
The American Breed,
Liaisons Dangereuses,
Eric Dolphy,
Janne Schatter,
The Shadows of Knight,
Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines,
Skriet,
Scan 7,
Man Eating Sloth,
The Red Krayola,
Funkadelic,
Au Pairs,
Henry Cow,
Radiopuhelimet,
Glenn Branca,
Howard Jones,
Audionom,
Deakin,
This Heat,
Massinfluence,
Cameo,
Dual Sessions,
Donald Byrd,
Gerry Rafferty,
Schoolly D,
10cc,
Duran Duran,
Suicide,
Vainqueur,
Index,
Moby Grape,
The Buckinghams,
Lightning Bolt,
Donny Hathaway,
Sugar Minott,
Second Layer,
James Chance & The Contortions,
Chris Corsano,
Junior Murvin,
Mad Mike, Mad Mike, Mad Mike, Mad Mike.
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.