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 Uzbekistan and from Calgary.
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 1965 to 1978.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Salvador and Columbus.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Johannesburg 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 güiro sounds with much patience.
I was there when Robert Palmer 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 Kinks to the rock kids.
I played it at the Troubador.
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 Suburban Knight. All the underground hits.
All Sugar Minott tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Gastr Del Sol record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal funk hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '60s cut and another box set from the '90s.
I hear you're buying an oboe and a chamberlin and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Main Source record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought a snare.
I hear that you and your band have sold your snare and bought a clarinet.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Babytalk,
The Sound,
The Mighty Diamonds,
Yaz,
Trumans Water,
Thee Headcoats,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
The Detroit Cobras,
Ultra Naté,
Amazonics,
Lindisfarne,
The Real Kids,
Essential Logic,
John Coltrane,
London Community Gospel Choir,
Jacob Miller,
Crispian St. Peters,
Brothers Johnson,
Lightning Bolt,
The Fall,
Liliput,
Camouflage,
The Gap Band,
Wasted Youth,
Beasts of Bourbon,
James Chance & The Contortions,
Ronan,
Ituana,
Masters at Work,
Dual Sessions,
Jesper Dahlbäck,
Ronnie Foster,
a-ha,
Banda Bassotti,
Barrington Levy,
Deadbeat,
Susan Cadogan,
Angry Samoans,
The Walker Brothers,
Liaisons Dangereuses,
Second Layer,
Byron Stingily,
Soul Sonic Force,
Section 25,
Kango’s Stein Massive,
Electric Prunes,
Neu!,
The Dirtbombs,
Malaria!,
The Tremeloes,
Mo-Dettes,
Ohio Players,
Steve Hackett,
Yazoo,
The Wake,
Accadde A,
The Trojans,
Scan 7,
Girls At Our Best!,
The Electric Prunes,
Funkadelic, Funkadelic, Funkadelic, Funkadelic.
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.