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 Sierra Leone and from Johannesburg.
But I was there.
I was there in 1970.
I was there at the first Onyeabor show in Enugu.
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 1967 to 1970.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in London and Madrid.
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 1979 at the first Second Layer practice in a loft in South London.
I was working on the marimba sounds with much patience.
I was there when Donald Fagen 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 Max Romeo to the rock kids.
I played it at the Hacienda.
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 Joe Finger. All the underground hits.
All Subhumans tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Colin Newman record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal rap hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '80s cut and another box set from the '90s.
I hear you're buying an oboe and a harpsichord and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a MDC record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your spring reverb and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought a spring reverb.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Jandek,
Yellowson,
Slick Rick,
Delta 5,
Japan,
UT,
The Gladiators,
Big Daddy Kane,
Marine Girls,
Dual Sessions,
The Blues Magoos,
Amazonics,
Faust,
The Star Department,
Bang On A Can,
Country Joe & The Fish,
Dark Day,
Joey Negro,
Bootsy's Rubber Band,
Lalann,
The Men They Couldn't Hang,
Clear Light,
Vaughan Mason & Crew,
The Doors,
Thinking Fellers Union Local 282,
Andrew Hill,
Robert Görl,
Suburban Knight,
Bad Manners,
Roy Ayers Ubiquity,
The Dead C,
the Association,
The Gap Band,
Lebanon Hanover,
Kerrie Biddell,
The United States of America,
Traffic Nightmare,
The Standells,
Q and Not U,
U.S. Maple,
Eve St. Jones,
Schoolly D,
Arcadia,
Thompson Twins,
The Shadows of Knight,
Red Lorry Yellow Lorry,
Tommy Roe,
Gang Starr,
Ash Ra Tempel,
Crash Course in Science,
Fela Kuti,
Susan Cadogan,
Mark Hollis,
The Slits,
Robert Wyatt,
Piero Umiliani,
Brass Construction,
Fear,
Alphaville,
Man Parrish,
New Age Steppers,
Outsiders, Outsiders, Outsiders, Outsiders.
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.