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 Ghana and from Tehran.
But I was there.
I was there in 1983.
I was there at the first Bronski Beat show in Brixton.
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 1977.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Philadelphia and Toronto.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Hong Kong 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 1973 at the first Television practice in a loft in New York.
I was working on the sitar 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 Jerry Gold Smith to the disco kids.
I played it at the Spitz.
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 Kurtis Blow. All the underground hits.
All Susan Cadogan tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Ornette Coleman record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal grunge hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '70s cut and another box set from the '80s.
I hear you're buying a spring reverb and a clarinet and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Notorious Big And Bone Thugs record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your synthesizer and bought a 808.
I hear that you and your band have sold your 808 and bought a synthesizer.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Last Poets,
Lonnie Liston Smith,
Marcia Griffiths,
Amazonics,
Kool G Rap & DJ Polo,
Basic Channel,
This Heat,
Bootsy's Rubber Band,
Barry Ungar,
The Names,
Television,
Larry & the Blue Notes,
Public Enemy,
Lyres,
Deakin,
Peter Gordon & Love of Life Orchestra,
Avey Tare,
Panda Bear,
Qualms,
David Bowie,
Essential Logic,
Erasure,
Wolf Eyes,
Lindisfarne,
Jimmy McGriff,
Yazoo,
Crispian St. Peters,
The New Christs,
Magazine,
The Residents,
Oblivians,
The Gap Band,
Heaven 17,
Popol Vuh,
Amon Düül II,
Severed Heads,
Joensuu 1685,
the Germs,
The Sisters of Mercy,
Make Up,
Blancmange,
Stockholm Monsters,
The Dead C,
Bang On A Can,
Brass Construction,
Camouflage,
Schoolly D,
Sarah Menescal,
In Retrospect,
Albert Ayler,
Bronski Beat,
Metal Thangz,
Echo & the Bunnymen,
Model 500,
Brothers Johnson,
Johnny Clarke,
Kango’s Stein Massive,
Kurtis Blow,
Fugazi,
Dorothy Ashby, Dorothy Ashby, Dorothy Ashby, Dorothy Ashby.
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.