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 Kiribati and from Milan.
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 1966 to 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Salvador and Woodstock.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Glasgow 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 1973 at the first Television practice in a loft in New York.
I was working on the rhodes sounds with much patience.
I was there when Nile Rodgers 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 Albert Ayler to the funk kids.
I played it at the Roxy.
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 Suicide. All the underground hits.
All Los Fastidios tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every The Doobie Brothers record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal grunge hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '80s cut and another box set from the '80s.
I hear you're buying a snare and a spring reverb and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Charles Mingus record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your marimba and bought a clarinet.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought a marimba.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Radiohead,
Camberwell Now,
The Vogues,
Banda Bassotti,
The Wake,
Morten Harket,
Shoche,
Ronnie Foster,
Kerri Chandler,
Eric Copeland,
Jawbox,
The Royal Family And The Poor,
Sight & Sound,
Faraquet,
The Residents,
China Crisis,
Visionaries,LMNO, T- Love & Iriscience,
Henry Cow,
The Music Machine,
A Certain Ratio,
Hardrive,
Blake Baxter,
Bauhaus,
Susan Cadogan,
Quadrant,
Lindisfarne,
Pagans,
Ossler,
Grandmaster Flash,
The Raincoats,
Kaleidoscope,
Freddie Wadling,
Gil Scott-Heron and Jamie xx,
Grey Daturas,
Lightning Bolt,
Sound Behaviour,
Carl Craig,
Minnie Riperton,
Slave,
Amazonics,
Larry & the Blue Notes,
Frankie Knuckles,
the Human League,
Newcleus,
Skaos,
Sex Pistols,
LL Cool J,
Ultramagnetic MC's,
John Foxx,
Barclay James Harvest,
Nick Fraelich,
Wasted Youth,
Duran Duran,
Lee Hazlewood,
Todd Terry,
Teenage Jesus and the Jerks,
The Velvet Underground,
Fela Kuti,
Ponytail,
The Gun Club,
Vainqueur, Vainqueur, Vainqueur, Vainqueur.
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.