Privilege

Ivor Cutler's first album since 1978's career high point Life in a Scotch Sitting Room, Volume Two, 1983's Privilege is a bit of an oddity in Cutler's oeuvre. Produced by ambient music pioneers David Toop and Steve Beresford, this is the first Cutler album since 1967's George Martin-produced Ludo with a musical component beyond the artist's own piano and harmonium parts. Toop and Beresford place his droll Scotch-accented recitations and homely singing in musical settings dominated by Eno-like keyboard effects, banjo, euphonium, and alto flute. Too melodic to be truly ambient, the musical passages are nonetheless subordinate to Cutler's lyrics, poems, and short stories. Another oddity is that Linda Hirst, who recites several of the poems and adds subtle wordless backing vocals to some of the musical passages, gets co-billing with Cutler on the front cover. Unlike Phyllis April King, who wrote and recited several tracks on Cutler's 1970s albums for Virgin Records, Hirst is merely vocal talent, and while she helps add to the overall sense of variety on the album, her contribution fades in comparison to the more striking work done by Beresford and Toop. Regardless, Privilege is, as always, Cutler's show all the way. From the opening imprecation "Sit Down" to the surprisingly melodic closer "Women of the World," which was actually a minor hit on the U.K. indie charts, Cutler's idiosyncratic sense of dry, mordant humor permeates every moment of Privilege. For longtime fans, he even includes two brand new episodes of "Life in a Scotch Sitting Room, Volume Two" as well as two new entries in his equally beloved "Jungle Tips" series of short prescriptive poems. ~ Stewart Mason