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 Korea North and from Jakarta.
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 1966 to 1973.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Winnipeg and Tokyo.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Bologna 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 1983 at the first Lewis practice in a loft in Vancouver.
I was working on the organ 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 Whodini to the dance 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 Index. All the underground hits.
All Warsaw tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Wings 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 '90s.
I hear you're buying a rhodes and a linndrum and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your arpeggiator and bought a sitar.
I hear that you and your band have sold your sitar and bought an arpeggiator.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Monks,
Liliput,
Section 25,
Unwound,
Bad Manners,
The Men They Couldn't Hang,
Bill Near,
Rod Modell,
The Cowsills,
Parry Music,
Davy DMX,
Donald Byrd,
Byron Stingily,
World's Most,
10cc,
Ultravox,
Bauhaus,
The Gories,
The Trojans,
The Slackers,
KRS-One,
The Durutti Column,
Buzzcocks,
Bob Dylan,
Blake Baxter,
Nick Fraelich,
Yusef Lateef,
Peter Gordon & Love of Life Orchestra,
Mad Mike,
The Last Poets,
Angry Samoans,
Pagans,
Mission of Burma,
Rotary Connection,
Excepter,
Charles Mingus,
the Slits,
Lou Reed & Metallica,
Stetsasonic,
Major Organ And The Adding Machine,
Cal Tjader,
Nils Olav,
Wasted Youth,
The Wake,
Bobby Byrd,
Accadde A,
Sällskapet,
Sunsets and Hearts,
Throbbing Gristle,
Depeche Mode,
Robert Hood,
Letta Mbulu,
Todd Terry,
Funky Four + One,
Wolf Eyes,
The Dead C,
The Grass Roots,
The Offenders,
Zapp,
Peter and Kerry,
Soul II Soul,
Faraquet, Faraquet, Faraquet, Faraquet.
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.