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 Switzerland and from Shanghai.
But I was there.
I was there in 1976.
I was there at the first Feelies show in Haledon.
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 1970.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Lille and Mumbai.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Lagos 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 Second Layer practice in a loft in South London.
I was working on the arpeggiator sounds with much patience.
I was there when Holger Czukay 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 Y Pants to the disco kids.
I played it at the Astoria.
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 Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft. All the underground hits.
All Quantec tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Marshall Jefferson record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal crunk hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '70s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a theremin and a guitar and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Hoover record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your oboe and bought a clarinet.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought an oboe.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Radiohead,
Excepter,
Kerri Chandler,
John Foxx,
The Jesus and Mary Chain,
Crispy Ambulance,
Dennis Brown,
Television Personalities,
Skarface,
Matthew Bourne,
Inner City,
Funkadelic,
Hoover,
Lee Hazlewood,
Drive Like Jehu,
Interpol,
the Soft Cell,
The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band,
The Golliwogs,
The American Breed,
Gong,
The Litter,
Wire,
Kango’s Stein Massive,
The Five Americans,
Lower 48,
Erasure,
John Lydon,
Nation of Ulysses,
Black Moon,
Curtis Mayfield,
Peter & Gordon,
The Young Rascals,
Robert Görl,
Harpers Bizarre,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
Q65,
Rosa Yemen,
Rahsaan Roland Kirk,
The Grass Roots,
Chris & Cosey,
Barry Ungar,
Amon Düül,
Second Layer,
Aswad,
The Evens,
Donny Hathaway,
Henry Cow,
DJ Style,
La Düsseldorf,
Arcadia,
The Black Dice,
Derrick Morgan,
Stereo Dub,
Reuben Wilson,
Crispian St. Peters,
Ossler,
Carl Craig, Carl Craig, Carl Craig, Carl Craig.
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.