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 Kosovo and from Tehran.
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 1968 to 1972.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Salvador and Mumbai.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Accra 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 oboe sounds with much patience.
I was there when Lou Reed 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 Cabaret Voltaire to the grime 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 Liliput. All the underground hits.
All Sly & The Family Stone tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Rotary Connection 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 '80s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a spring reverb and a sitar and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a The Fuzztones record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your chamberlin and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought a chamberlin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Lizzy Mercier Descloux,
Max Romeo,
Zapp,
Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks,
Jerry Gold Smith,
Alison Limerick,
Glambeats Corp.,
Suicide,
The Seeds,
Average White Band,
cv313,
Kerrie Biddell,
Organ,
The Slits,
Joey Negro,
Visage,
Fear,
Rapeman,
Hot Snakes,
Cymande,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
Marmalade,
Ituana,
Ken Boothe,
Lou Reed & Metallica,
Mr. Review,
Althea and Donna,
Moebius,
Nation of Ulysses,
Dawn Penn,
Fugazi,
The Pretty Things,
Livin' Joy,
The Stooges,
Beasts of Bourbon,
Jandek,
Sunsets and Hearts,
The Searchers,
Yazoo,
Soft Machine,
Easy Going,
Aloha Tigers,
Stiv Bators,
The Shadows of Knight,
Gian Franco Pienzio,
The Blues Magoos,
Godley & Creme,
Royal Trux,
Simply Red,
Brick,
Arab on Radar,
The Buckinghams,
The Associates,
The Detroit Cobras,
Mo-Dettes,
Reuben Wilson,
Alton Ellis,
Altered Images,
Albert Ayler,
Skarface, Skarface, Skarface, Skarface.
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.