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 Grenada and from Taipei.
But I was there.
I was there in 1983.
I was there at the first Lewis show in Vancouver.
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 1963 to 1974.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Sao Paulo and Manchester.
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 1977 at the first Mistral practice in a loft in Amsterdam.
I was working on the rhodes sounds with much patience.
I was there when Captain Beefheart 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 Gladiators to the techno kids.
I played it at the Troubador.
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 Ultra Naté. All the underground hits.
All Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every The Alarm Clocks record on German import.
I heard that you have a white label of every seminal disco hit - 1985, '86, '87.
I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '50s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a sitar and a synthesizer and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Oblivians record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your chamberlin and bought a harpsichord.
I hear that you and your band have sold your harpsichord and bought a chamberlin.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Brothers Johnson,
The Divine Comedy,
Ultravox,
Camouflage,
Parry Music,
Black Pus,
B.T. Express,
Connie Case,
Graham Central Station,
The Velvet Underground,
Camberwell Now,
Neil Young & Crazy Horse,
Zero Boys,
Television Personalities,
Pulsallama,
Babytalk,
Bronski Beat,
Glambeats Corp.,
Crooked Eye,
The Busters,
The Wake,
E-Dancer,
Janne Schatter,
R.M.O.,
Deepchord,
Dual Sessions,
Rowland S Howard / Lydia Lunch,
Jacob Miller,
Glenn Branca,
Eyeless In Gaza,
Soft Cell,
Zapp,
Funky Four + One,
FM Einheit,
Television,
Excepter,
DJ Sneak,
Deadbeat,
Stetsasonic,
Marvin Gaye,
Liliput,
Ossler,
Bang on a Can All-Stars,
Subhumans,
Lebanon Hanover,
Grandmaster Flash,
Masta Ace, Craig G, Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
Saccharine Trust,
Basic Channel,
Davy DMX,
The New Christs,
Alison Limerick,
Kaleidoscope,
Scratch Acid,
Swell Maps,
In Retrospect,
Bobby Byrd,
Altered Images,
Liaisons Dangereuses,
Nico,
Ornette Coleman,
Super Lover Cee & Casanova Rud,
Andrew Ashong & Theo Parrish,
the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics.
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.