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 Kiribati and from Lagos.
But I was there.
I was there in 1978.
I was there at the first Visage show in London.
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 1962 to 1973.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Shanghai and Accra.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Mumbai 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 1965 at the first Beefheart practice in a loft in Lancaster.
I was working on the rhodes sounds with much patience.
I was there when Donald Fagen 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 Royal Trux to the rock kids.
I played it at CBGB's.
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 Reuben Wilson. All the underground hits.
All Inner City tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Anthony Braxton 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 '80s.
I hear you're buying a sitar and an oboe 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 guitar and bought a theremin.
I hear that you and your band have sold your theremin and bought a guitar.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
The Golliwogs,
Dorothy Ashby,
Bad Manners,
Ponytail,
Roger Hodgson,
Fatback Band,
Mary Jane Girls,
Soul II Soul,
Joyce Sims,
The Shadows of Knight,
The American Breed,
Don Cherry,
Robert Hood,
Intrusion,
Alison Limerick,
Country Teasers,
Moby Grape,
Gary Puckett & The Union Gap,
X-Ray Spex,
The Cowsills,
World's Most,
Sun Ra Arkestra,
Alice Coltrane,
Sun City Girls,
The Remains,
Television,
Skriet,
Harry Pussy,
The Dirtbombs,
Nils Olav,
The Residents,
Black Flag,
Con Funk Shun,
Procol Harum,
The Vogues,
The Royal Family And The Poor,
The Star Department,
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band,
The Gun Club,
John Coltrane,
X-101,
Minor Threat,
Joy Division,
MDC,
Louis and Bebe Barron,
Janne Schatter,
Patti Smith,
Scrapy,
James White and The Blacks,
Aaron Thompson,
Strawberry Alarm Clock,
Eddi Front,
Kerrie Biddell,
Sex Pistols,
Archie Shepp,
8 Eyed Spy,
Yaz,
Alphaville,
The Alarm Clocks,
Gang Gang Dance,
The Flesh Eaters,
Trumans Water,
Scratch Acid,
Tres Demented, Tres Demented, Tres Demented, Tres Demented.
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.