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 Tuvalu and from Milan.
But I was there.
I was there in 1971.
I was there at the first Big Star show in Memphis.
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 1975.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Accra and Tehran.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Cairo 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 linndrum sounds with much patience.
I was there when Captain Beefheart 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 Traffic Nightmare to the dance kids.
I played it at the Troubador.
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 Scrapy. All the underground hits.
All Black Sheep tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Sun Ra record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal rock hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '80s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a sitar and a synthesizer and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Cabaret Voltaire record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your chamberlin and bought a mellotron.
I hear that you and your band have sold your mellotron and bought a chamberlin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Bang on a Can All-Stars,
Pantaleimon,
Basic Channel,
The Count Five,
Young Marble Giants,
Banda Bassotti,
Sugar Minott,
The Tremeloes,
Massinfluence,
The Motions,
The Victims,
Cybotron,
Byron Stingily,
Sexual Harrassment,
X-Ray Spex,
Minnie Riperton,
The Smoke,
Slave,
Ken Boothe,
Porter Ricks,
Marine Girls,
Faust,
Mo-Dettes,
FM Einheit,
Drive Like Jehu,
Aaron Thompson,
Accadde A,
Skaos,
Soft Cell,
the Slits,
Leonard Cohen,
The Martian,
Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft,
Bad Manners,
Guru Guru,
Connie Case,
Con Funk Shun,
Swell Maps,
Ronnie Foster,
Mantronix,
Harry Pussy,
B.T. Express,
Ten City,
The Monochrome Set,
Crispy Ambulance,
The Sonics,
Sound Behaviour,
Severed Heads,
Harmonia,
Scion,
Youth Brigade,
Dawn Penn,
Zapp,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five,
Sex Pistols,
Ultra Naté,
Neil Young,
Brothers Johnson,
Pantytec,
The United States of America,
Warren Ellis,
Andrew Hill, Andrew Hill, Andrew Hill, Andrew Hill.
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.