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 Lithuania and from Hong Kong.
But I was there.
I was there in 1968.
I was there at the first Bowie show in Bromley.
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 1977.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Bremen and Lagos.
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 1983 at the first Art of Noise practice in a loft in London.
I was working on the guitar sounds with much patience.
I was there when Holger Czukay 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 Robert Wyatt to the funk 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 Section 25. All the underground hits.
All Alphaville tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Susan Cadogan 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 '80s.
I hear you're buying a chamberlin and a rhodes and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Colin Newman record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought an organ.
I hear that you and your band have sold your organ and bought a clarinet.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Buzzcocks,
Ken Boothe,
Duran Duran,
X-Ray Spex,
Electric Light Orchestra,
Lebanon Hanover,
The Move,
Iggy Pop,
The Kinks,
Crime,
The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band,
Morten Harket,
Sexual Harrassment,
Slick Rick,
The Fire Engines,
Ten City,
Chris Corsano,
Con Funk Shun,
Nation of Ulysses,
Echo & the Bunnymen,
Unwound,
Aloha Tigers,
Blake Baxter,
Lungfish,
Magma,
Essential Logic,
Mandrill,
Surgeon,
Dennis Brown,
Gang Gang Dance,
Lindisfarne,
Rapeman,
Crispy Ambulance,
David McCallum,
Lyres,
Piero Umiliani,
the Association,
Peter and Kerry,
JFA,
Excepter,
The Saints,
KRS-One,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
Sam Rivers,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
Crispian St. Peters,
Johnny Clarke,
The Victims,
Agent Orange,
Underground Resistance,
Erasure,
Massinfluence,
Pussy Galore,
Moebius,
Chris & Cosey,
Procol Harum,
DJ Style,
Audionom,
Masta Ace, Craig G, Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane,
Tubeway Army,
Yellowson,
Thompson Twins,
Soft Machine,
Carl Craig, Carl Craig, Carl Craig, Carl Craig.
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.