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 France and from Mumbai.
But I was there.
I was there in 1976.
I was there at the first Chic show in New York.
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 1961 to 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Mumbai and Hong Kong.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Spokane 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 theremin sounds with much patience.
I was there when David Bowie 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 Underground Resistance to the techno kids.
I played it at the Crocodile.
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 Vladislav Delay. All the underground hits.
All The Buckinghams tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Half Japanese 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 '70s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a güiro and a rhodes and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your arpeggiator and bought an organ.
I hear that you and your band have sold your organ and bought an arpeggiator.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Robert Wyatt,
Scrapy,
The Grass Roots,
B.T. Express,
Spoonie Gee,
Sarah Menescal,
Alison Limerick,
Can,
Chris & Cosey,
The Flesh Eaters,
Smog,
Au Pairs,
Mandrill,
the Swans,
The Fuzztones,
Mad Mike,
Yazoo,
Pharoah Sanders,
Dawn Penn,
Faraquet,
Circle Jerks,
OOIOO,
Nation of Ulysses,
Sixth Finger,
Suicide,
Los Fastidios,
Dorothy Ashby,
Warsaw,
London Community Gospel Choir,
CMW,
The Victims,
The Fire Engines,
Public Enemy,
Dark Day,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
Black Bananas,
Babytalk,
Jeru the Damaja,
Interpol,
Thompson Twins,
Quando Quango,
The Happenings,
Kauko Röyhkä ja Narttu,
Con Funk Shun,
Kurtis Blow,
Funky Four + One,
MC5,
Lebanon Hanover,
Arcadia,
Joy Division,
Glenn Branca,
Soul II Soul,
Aswad,
Sexual Harrassment,
Pylon,
Davy DMX,
Danielle Patucci,
the Fania All-Stars,
Main Source,
Neu!,
Section 25,
Clear Light,
X-102, X-102, X-102, X-102.
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.