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 Costa Rica and from Bremen.
But I was there.
I was there in 1976.
I was there at the first Buzzcocks show in Bolton.
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 1963 to 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Calgary and Cairo.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Mumbai 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 1970 at the first Onyeabor practice in a loft in Enugu.
I was working on the clarinet sounds with much patience.
I was there when Michael McDonald 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 Notorious BIG live in Amsterdam to the rap 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 Supertramp. All the underground hits.
All Crash Course in Science tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Babytalk 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 '50s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a spring reverb and a snare and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Lyres record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought a clarinet.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought a rhodes.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Groovy Waters,
The Alarm Clocks,
Terrestrial Tones,
Glenn Branca,
Urselle,
Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson,
Junior Murvin,
The Beau Brummels,
The Peanut Butter Conspiracy,
Guru Guru,
Rekid,
Country Joe & The Fish,
World's Most,
Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth,
E-Dancer,
Glambeats Corp.,
Radio Birdman,
The Real Kids,
LL Cool J,
Eric Dolphy,
John Cale,
Rakim,
Rod Modell,
Sonic Youth,
Pantytec,
Chrome,
Drexciya,
Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks,
Y Pants,
Yellowson,
Liaisons Dangereuses,
Mandrill,
Brick,
Clear Light,
Can,
Harpers Bizarre,
Quantec,
Big Daddy Kane,
Joe Finger,
ABC,
Charles Mingus,
Teenage Jesus and the Jerks,
Johnny Clarke,
Arcadia,
B.T. Express,
China Crisis,
The Doors,
Boredoms,
Amon Düül II,
The Victims,
New Order,
Derrick Morgan,
Warsaw,
Heaven 17,
Swell Maps,
Lou Reed & Metallica,
The Pretty Things,
Jerry's Kids,
DNA,
The United States of America,
PIL,
the Germs, the Germs, the Germs, the Germs.
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.