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 Finland and from Portland.
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 1968 to 1976.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Hong Kong and Mexico City.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Calgary 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 1968 at the first Bowie practice in a loft in Bromley.
I was working on the güiro sounds with much patience.
I was there when Robert Palmer 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 China Crisis to the rap 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 Harry Pussy. All the underground hits.
All Pharoah Sanders tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Au Pairs 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 '80s.
I hear you're buying a spring reverb and a rhodes and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Cecil Taylor record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your marimba and bought a linndrum.
I hear that you and your band have sold your linndrum and bought a marimba.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
De La Soul & Jungle Brothers,
Leonard Cohen,
Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft,
Todd Rundgren,
Marvin Gaye,
Johnny Osbourne,
Bronski Beat,
The Associates,
Suburban Knight,
Brand Nubian,
Cluster,
Nils Olav,
Soft Cell,
Darondo,
Talk Talk,
Sound Behaviour,
Robert Görl,
Jeru the Damaja,
Johnny Clarke,
Bootsy Collins,
Roy Ayers Ubiquity,
Josef K,
Howard Jones,
World's Most,
Alphaville,
Zero Boys,
Jerry's Kids,
The Gap Band,
Bizarre Inc.,
X-101,
Saccharine Trust,
the Fania All-Stars,
Mo-Dettes,
Bob Dylan,
One Last Wish,
Average White Band,
Dead Boys,
ABC,
Pharoah Sanders,
Groovy Waters,
L. Decosne,
Infiniti,
The Jesus and Mary Chain,
Tubeway Army,
Peter Gordon & Love of Life Orchestra,
Eden Ahbez,
Mars,
Silicon Teens,
The Royal Family And The Poor,
Idris Muhammad,
The Alarm Clocks,
Public Enemy,
Eric Dolphy,
Altered Images,
Harry Pussy,
The Names,
The Five Americans,
David McCallum,
Andrew Ashong & Theo Parrish,
Pere Ubu,
Matthew Halsall,
Man Eating Sloth,
Cabaret Voltaire,
Blancmange, Blancmange, Blancmange, Blancmange.
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.