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 Benin and from Halifax.
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 1960 to 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Shanghai and Johannesburg.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Salvador 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 Big Star practice in a loft in Memphis.
I was working on the theremin 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 Talk Talk to the grunge 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 OOIOO. All the underground hits.
All Sight & Sound tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Connie Case record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal crunk hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '70s cut and another box set from the '80s.
I hear you're buying an oboe and an organ and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Ultravox record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your güiro and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought a güiro.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Marine Girls,
Tears for Fears,
Sad Lovers and Giants,
Boogie Down Productions,
Laurel Aitken,
Gong,
Groovy Waters,
John Lydon,
Roy Ayers Ubiquity,
The Music Machine,
The Seeds,
Porter Ricks,
Black Pus,
Newcleus,
Swell Maps,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Delta 5,
Section 25,
Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines,
John Holt,
The Toasters,
Robert Wyatt,
Erasure,
the Germs,
Model 500,
Wasted Youth,
Sarah Menescal,
Scan 7,
Oppenheimer Analysis,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
Sun City Girls,
Electric Prunes,
Sugar Minott,
Japan,
Con Funk Shun,
The Invisible,
Young Marble Giants,
the Slits,
The Moody Blues,
Ultimate Spinach,
Donald Byrd,
Minny Pops,
Boz Scaggs,
Major Organ And The Adding Machine,
Mark Hollis,
Heavy D & The Boyz,
Junior Murvin,
The Martian,
The Names,
The Beau Brummels,
Dark Day,
Camberwell Now,
The Neon Judgement,
Dorothy Ashby,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Magazine,
Gang Starr,
The Wake,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
Agitation Free,
Crispy Ambulance, Crispy Ambulance, Crispy Ambulance, Crispy Ambulance.
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.