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 Saudi Arabia and from Edmonton.
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 1967 to 1976.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Johannesburg and Philadelphia.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Shanghai 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 Can practice in a loft in Cologne.
I was working on the snare 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 Lizzy Mercier Descloux to the dance 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 Unrelated Segments. All the underground hits.
All Sällskapet tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Minny Pops record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal techno hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '70s cut and another box set from the '90s.
I hear you're buying a harpsichord and an oboe and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Bill Near record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your arpeggiator and bought a rhodes.
I hear that you and your band have sold your rhodes and bought an arpeggiator.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Vaughan Mason & Crew,
Slave,
Warren Ellis,
Organ,
New York Dolls,
Visage,
R.M.O.,
Sticky Fingaz feat. Raekwon,
Eric Copeland,
Groovy Waters,
Sonic Youth,
The Grass Roots,
Janne Schatter,
Marcia Griffiths,
Sun Ra,
Essential Logic,
Ronan,
Rahsaan Roland Kirk,
H. Thieme,
Connie Case,
Heaven 17,
Harmonia,
Barbara Tucker,
Mo-Dettes,
Lalo Schifrin,
Toni Rubio,
The Zeros,
Kayak,
Nick Fraelich,
the Human League,
Lucky Dragons,
The Shadows of Knight,
Unrelated Segments,
Hot Snakes,
Magazine,
The Pop Group,
Cecil Taylor,
Skarface,
The Dave Clark Five,
Black Bananas,
Super Lover Cee & Casanova Rud,
Beasts of Bourbon,
LL Cool J,
Chris Corsano,
Lindisfarne,
Peter & Gordon,
Eli Mardock,
Bobby Womack,
The American Breed,
The Selecter,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Ice-T,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
Roxy Music,
Rhythm & Sound,
Roy Ayers,
The Mojo Men,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Bobbi Humphrey,
New Order, New Order, New Order, New Order.
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.