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 Comoros and from Copenhagen.
But I was there.
I was there in 1975.
I was there at the first Ubu show in Cleveland.
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 1960 to 1973.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Philadelphia and Cairo.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Accra 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 1979 at the first Josef K practice in a loft in Edinburgh.
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 Main Source to the grunge kids.
I played it at Trash.
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 Donny Hathaway. All the underground hits.
All Dorothy Ashby tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Howard Jones record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal disco 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 chamberlin and a linndrum and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson 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?
Motorama,
Country Teasers,
Matthew Bourne,
The Cure,
Groovy Waters,
Guru Guru,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Animal Collective,
Jeff Lynne,
Youth Brigade,
Whodini,
Lindisfarne,
Soul Sonic Force,
Robert Wyatt,
The Dave Clark Five,
Buzzcocks,
Bobbi Humphrey,
Curtis Mayfield,
Be Bop Deluxe,
Joe Smooth,
ABC,
Red Lorry Yellow Lorry,
Subhumans,
Yaz,
Idris Muhammad,
Swell Maps,
Todd Rundgren,
Dead Boys,
Chris & Cosey,
The Tremeloes,
The Alarm Clocks,
K-Klass,
Surgeon,
The Mojo Men,
Technova,
The Sound,
Drexciya,
Fear,
Pulsallama,
Gang Green,
Slave,
Bush Tetras,
Sex Pistols,
Charles Mingus,
T. Rex,
Clear Light,
Derrick May,
Girls At Our Best!,
Nirvana,
Camberwell Now,
Hoover,
the Sonics,
Max Romeo,
Stiv Bators,
Aloha Tigers,
JFA,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Con Funk Shun,
Jesper Dahlbäck,
Amazonics,
Warsaw, Warsaw, Warsaw, Warsaw.
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.