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 Barbados and from Paris.
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 1961 to 1974.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Spokane and Woodstock.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Manchester 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 mellotron sounds with much patience.
I was there when Michael McDonald 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 Blossom Toes to the jazz 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 Moss Icon. All the underground hits.
All Brothers Johnson tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Colin Newman record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal electroclash hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '80s cut and another box set from the '90s.
I hear you're buying a theremin and a spring reverb and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Man Eating Sloth record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your harpsichord and bought a sitar.
I hear that you and your band have sold your sitar and bought a harpsichord.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Dual Sessions,
Circle Jerks,
Soul II Soul,
Liliput,
Trumans Water,
Aloha Tigers,
JFA,
The Flesh Eaters,
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five,
D'Angelo,
Parry Music,
Radiopuhelimet,
Tres Demented,
Nirvana,
U.S. Maple,
Lou Reed,
Traffic Nightmare,
Beasts of Bourbon,
Masters at Work,
Pylon,
Stereo Dub,
Bob Dylan,
Byron Stingily,
Lee Hazlewood,
Patti Smith,
Severed Heads,
Sun City Girls,
Swell Maps,
Godley & Creme,
Eden Ahbez,
Von Mondo,
MC5,
The Fuzztones,
Rekid,
Lalann,
Marine Girls,
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark,
Roy Ayers,
Robert Wyatt,
Juan Atkins,
Peter and Kerry,
Dorothy Ashby,
Todd Terry,
Lebanon Hanover,
The Slits,
Lightning Bolt,
The Selecter,
Hasil Adkins,
Sight & Sound,
Spoonie Gee,
Donny Hathaway,
Pulsallama,
Dave Gahan,
Thinking Fellers Union Local 282,
The Raincoats,
the Fania All-Stars,
Rakim,
the Human League,
the Normal,
Blossom Toes,
The Skatalites,
Roxy Music,
Fluxion, Fluxion, Fluxion, Fluxion.
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.