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 Niger and from Toronto.
But I was there.
I was there in 1976.
I was there at the first Wire show in Watford.
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 1961 to 1974.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Sao Paulo and Copenhagen.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Delhi 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 Neu! practice in a loft in Düsseldorf.
I was working on the linndrum sounds with much patience.
I was there when Tom Verlaine 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 Gang Starr to the grime kids.
I played it at CBGB's.
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 Lonnie Liston Smith. All the underground hits.
All These Immortal Souls tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Dead Boys record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal jazz 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 sitar and a spring reverb and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Liliput record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your oboe and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought an oboe.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
James Chance & The Contortions,
Ken Boothe,
Royal Trux,
OOIOO,
Oppenheimer Analysis,
Ten City,
Soft Machine,
Bootsy Collins,
It's A Beautiful Day,
Minutemen,
Godley & Creme,
Aloha Tigers,
Moby Grape,
Colin Newman,
Zapp,
Lafayette Afro Rock Band,
Slave,
Tubeway Army,
Mission of Burma,
Basic Channel,
Inner City,
Roxette,
Youth Brigade,
Bob Dylan,
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five,
Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks,
ABBA,
Henry Cow,
X-Ray Spex,
Fluxion,
Fat Boys,
UT,
Monolake,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Delta 5,
In Retrospect,
Man Eating Sloth,
The Knickerbockers,
The Blackbyrds,
The Human League,
Lucky Dragons,
Make Up,
Schoolly D,
Beasts of Bourbon,
Crispian St. Peters,
Slick Rick,
Flash Fearless,
Scion,
B.T. Express,
Fugazi,
Au Pairs,
Stiv Bators,
The Last Poets,
10cc,
Rapeman,
The Seeds,
Kaleidoscope,
Clear Light,
June Days,
The Grass Roots,
Jerry's Kids,
Aswad,
Tim Buckley, Tim Buckley, Tim Buckley, Tim Buckley.
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.