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 Vanuatu and from Mexico City.
But I was there.
I was there in 1979.
I was there at the first Josef K show in Edinburgh.
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 1962 to 1973.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Jakarta and Toronto.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Winnipeg 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 808 sounds with much patience.
I was there when Michael McDonald 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 John Holt to the techno kids.
I played it at Cafe Wha.
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 Main Source. All the underground hits.
All Warren Ellis tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every The Red Krayola record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal grime 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 a synthesizer and an arpeggiator and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Section 25 record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your arpeggiator and bought a snare.
I hear that you and your band have sold your snare and bought an arpeggiator.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Cramps,
Nation of Ulysses,
Scrapy,
Kayak,
Arab on Radar,
Warren Ellis,
Bootsy Collins,
Isaac Hayes,
X-Ray Spex,
The Seeds,
Skaos,
Marvin Gaye,
Procol Harum,
DeepChord presents Echospace,
Juan Atkins,
Whodini,
Lakeside,
The Human League,
Terry Callier,
Khruangbin,
The Doors,
Liliput,
Art Ensemble Of Chicago,
Quando Quango,
The Music Machine,
Susan Cadogan,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Technova,
Soul II Soul,
Kaleidoscope,
The Dave Clark Five,
Brothers Johnson,
Nirvana,
Unrelated Segments,
Radiopuhelimet,
Gong,
The Martian,
Black Bananas,
Japan,
the Bar-Kays,
Yellowson,
Soft Cell,
Scott Walker + Sunn O))),
The Zeros,
The Moleskins,
Rosa Yemen,
Joey Negro,
Sällskapet,
AZ,
Flipper,
De La Soul & Jungle Brothers,
Jacob Miller,
Alphaville,
Tomorrow,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Saccharine Trust,
Alton Ellis,
Teenage Jesus and the Jerks,
Deepchord,
The Alarm Clocks,
Pierre Henry,
Fear, Fear, Fear, Fear.
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.