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 Swaziland and from Spokane.
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 1965 to 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Accra and Manila.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Shanghai 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 1971 at the first Selda practice in a loft in Istanbul.
I was working on the rhodes sounds with much patience.
I was there when Michael McDonald 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 H. Thieme to the techno kids.
I played it at Cafe Wha.
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 Star Department. All the underground hits.
All Electric Light Orchestra tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every The Gap Band record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal funk 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 a synthesizer and a mellotron and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a The Invisible record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your theremin and bought an organ.
I hear that you and your band have sold your organ and bought a theremin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Sunsets and Hearts,
Echo & the Bunnymen,
Man Parrish,
The Techniques,
Ultramagnetic MC's,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
Joe Smooth,
Barbara Tucker,
Television Personalities,
Youth Brigade,
Lou Reed,
Liliput,
X-102,
The Gories,
Drexciya,
Ornette Coleman,
Mo-Dettes,
Red Lorry Yellow Lorry,
Tom Boy,
Isaac Hayes,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Kurtis Blow,
The Skatalites,
Lebanon Hanover,
Kool G Rap & DJ Polo,
Dorothy Ashby,
Wire,
Roxy Music,
The Saints,
the Fania All-Stars,
Junior Murvin,
The Associates,
Lindisfarne,
Joe Finger,
Rekid,
Prince Buster,
China Crisis,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
The Dave Clark Five,
Gil Scott Heron,
ABC,
The Moleskins,
Eric B and Rakim,
Oppenheimer Analysis,
Q and Not U,
Fear,
ABBA,
Blossom Toes,
Swans,
Neu!,
Man Eating Sloth,
Moss Icon,
The Invisible,
Mission of Burma,
Skaos,
New York Dolls,
The Star Department,
The Five Americans,
The Mummies,
Kerri Chandler,
Cymande,
the Normal, the Normal, the Normal, the Normal.
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.