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 Mauritius and from Manchester.
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 1969 to 1979.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Jakarta and Shanghai.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Woodstock 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 1968 at the first Bowie practice in a loft in Bromley.
I was working on the linndrum 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 the Slits to the crunk kids.
I played it at the Roxy.
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 Nick Fraelich. All the underground hits.
All Soft Cell 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 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 mellotron and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Siglo XX record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your snare and bought a clarinet.
I hear that you and your band have sold your clarinet and bought a snare.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Electric Prunes,
The Fire Engines,
Fear,
Lower 48,
Angels of Light & Akron/Family,
Fugazi,
Gong,
The Flesh Eaters,
The Standells,
Fat Boys,
The Jesus and Mary Chain,
Desert Stars,
The New Christs,
Robert Görl,
T. Rex,
Jesper Dahlback,
Rotary Connection,
Crime,
Blake Baxter,
Country Teasers,
Severed Heads,
Liliput,
The Grass Roots,
Beasts of Bourbon,
Popol Vuh,
The Saints,
X-102,
Alton Ellis,
Moby Grape,
The Monks,
Black Flag,
Hardrive,
Dorothy Ashby,
Iggy Pop,
Eddi Front,
Accadde A,
Yaz,
Agent Orange,
Arcadia,
Faust,
B.T. Express,
Fifty Foot Hose,
Model 500,
Mars,
Lizzy Mercier Descloux,
Glenn Branca,
Eli Mardock,
Q and Not U,
Albert Ayler,
Rod Modell,
Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines,
Groovy Waters,
Siglo XX,
The Last Poets,
Radiopuhelimet,
Kenny Larkin,
Wally Richardson,
Ultravox,
Smog,
Soul II Soul,
Audionom,
The Motions,
Cal Tjader,
10cc,
Nick Fraelich, Nick Fraelich, Nick Fraelich, Nick Fraelich.
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.