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 South Sudan and from Portland.
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 1971.
I'm losing my edge.
To all the kids in Accra and Edmonton.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Stockholm 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 1978 at the first Visage practice in a loft in London.
I was working on the synthesizer sounds with much patience.
I was there when Robert Palmer 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 Junior Murvin to the disco kids.
I played it at the Hacienda.
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 Nation of Ulysses. All the underground hits.
All Quantec tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Frankie Knuckles 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 '80s cut and another box set from the '70s.
I hear you're buying a synthesizer and a harpsichord and are throwing your macbook out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a The Last Poets record.
I hear that you and your band have sold your organ and bought a theremin.
I hear that you and your band have sold your theremin and bought an organ.
I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.
But have you seen my records?
Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines,
Crispian St. Peters,
8 Eyed Spy,
the Germs,
Jeff Mills,
Main Source,
Althea and Donna,
The Shadows of Knight,
Oppenheimer Analysis,
Motorama,
Neil Young,
Max Romeo,
De La Soul & Jungle Brothers,
Johnny Osbourne,
Vladislav Delay,
Radiohead,
Bronski Beat,
Ossler,
Glenn Branca,
Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks,
Scott Walker,
Joey Negro,
Erykah Badu,
The Leaves,
Manfred Mann's Earth Band,
John Holt,
The Neon Judgement,
Neu!,
Blake Baxter,
The Offenders,
Pet Shop Boys,
Flash Fearless,
The Fuzztones,
Tropical Tobacco,
DNA,
The Busters,
Juan Atkins,
Electric Prunes,
Siouxsie and the Banshees,
Liliput,
UT,
Richard Hell and the Voidoids,
Symarip,
Youth Brigade,
Bill Wells,
Kaleidoscope,
Ultramagnetic MC's,
Warren Ellis,
Fatback Band,
David Bowie,
Al Stewart,
Andrew Ashong & Theo Parrish,
Hashim,
The Sound,
Gastr Del Sol,
Ponytail,
The Skatalites,
Eurythmics,
Black Pus,
The Five Americans,
Lizzy Mercier Descloux,
China Crisis,
Scion, Scion, Scion, Scion.
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.