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 South Africa and from Salvador.
But I was there.
I was there in 1965.
I was there at the first Beefheart show in Lancaster.
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 1965 to 1975.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Taipei and Sao Paulo.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Columbus 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 808 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 The Fugs to the grime 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 The Fortunes. All the underground hits.
All Junior Murvin tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Arthur Verocai 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 '70s cut and another box set from the '80s.
I hear you're buying a synthesizer and a spring reverb and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Judy Mowatt record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your theremin and bought a güiro.
I hear that you and your band have sold your güiro and bought a theremin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Dead C,
Cluster,
Eve St. Jones,
Ten City,
Aaron Thompson,
The Alarm Clocks,
the Bar-Kays,
Television Personalities,
The Last Poets,
Motorama,
Slave,
Ajijia Myrayebe,
Little Man,
The Victims,
Can,
Unwound,
Piero Umiliani,
Wasted Youth,
Theoretical Girls,
Wings,
Kurtis Blow,
Ossler,
Alison Limerick,
Barry Ungar,
Hot Snakes,
Tomorrow,
Fela Kuti,
Throbbing Gristle,
Inner City,
Vainqueur,
Skaos,
Yusef Lateef,
Marc Almond,
Quando Quango,
The Wake,
The Modern Lovers,
A Flock of Seagulls,
Slick Rick,
The Evens,
Easy Going,
Janne Schatter,
The New Christs,
Blake Baxter,
Ituana,
The Cowsills,
Animal Collective,
Babytalk,
Essential Logic,
John Coltrane,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Sexual Harrassment,
Lou Reed & John Cale,
Pantaleimon,
Depeche Mode,
Sonny Sharrock,
Nik Kershaw,
The Mighty Diamonds,
The Kinks,
Tom Boy,
London Community Gospel Choir,
Crispy Ambulance,
Rites of Spring,
Los Fastidios,
Agent Orange, Agent Orange, Agent Orange, Agent Orange.
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.