*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed
Eimi crosswords tend to send me scurrying for the reference books and there were quite a few words in this that were new to me (13 across being particularly obscure, I thought). Overall though, it was an enjoyable puzzle with some good surface meanings (21 across, 4 and 5 being excellent).
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 9 | Launder: foreign articles (la un der). |
| 10 | Rummage: Rum age around m. |
| 11 | Palominos: Pal o’ Minos. |
| 12 | Abyss: hidden. |
| 13 | Verst: Vest around r. Vest here means place in the legal sense and verst is apparently some sort of Russian distance measurement. |
| 14 | Scintilla: soundalike of “sin tiller”. |
| 15 | Razored: R + Azed around or. |
| 18 | Red Meat: Red Heat with h (hour) converted to m (minute). |
| 21 | Stratagem: (mega tarts)<. |
| 24 | Nisan: Nan around I s. |
| 26 | Lazio: (I Zola)*. |
| 27,29 | Yves Saint-Laurent: (anti slavery tunes)*. |
| 28 | Fermata: (Farm [m]eat)*. One of those obscure musical terms that fit neatly in crossword grids. |
| Down | |
| 1 | Slip over: Pils<. |
| 2 | Curler: double def – Rhona Martin and a curler used to turn up one’s barnet (Barnet Fair = hair). |
| 3 | Odometer: Od + (meteor)*. |
| 4 | Uranus: U + RA + Sun<. |
| 5 | Trashier: (Are Hirst)*. |
| 6 | Impart: Imp art. Bosch painted lots of pictures of demons and the like. |
| 7 | Navy blue: navy + blue. |
| 8 | Geisha: GE is HA (chemical symbols). |
| 16 | Zero-zero: double definition (I assume Americans say zero-zero instead of nil-nil). |
| 17 | Doggy bag: cryptic def. |
| 19 | Dinosaur: (is around)*. |
| 20 | Tiny tots: double definition. |
| 21 | Spliff: SP + Liff[e]. |
| 22 | Trocar: carrot*. |
| 23 | Muesli: Muse with last two letters reversed + L I. |
| 25 | Snivel: Levis< around n. |
There’s a Nina here, but don’t ask me to explain it.
Having just managed to finish this tough puzzle on-line (with one or two ‘reveals’), I wondered what the neat nina was all about. Something salacious to do with 21a? No, apparently it’s an indie pop band, but what’s the connection with the rest of the grid?
I’m glad 13ac turned out to be so obscure I couldn’t possibly have got it without a dictionary. For 2 down, I just forgot where I’d heard the name Rhona Martin, so MULLET was my best definition-based guess. Bah.
As for the Nina, I can almost get the band’s single ‘Elvis ain’t dead’ from the area around 27ac, but other than that, I guess it’s just a token of appreciation.
Maybe he has a friend in the band? They were on telly yesterday playing at Glastonbury.
No great significance in the Nina – I just enjoyed their album (particularly the ‘hidden’ song about Michaela Strachan) and noticed that their name was a good length for a Nina. I have no friends in the band, or contacts in ITV scheduling – the fact that Red Heat is on ITV tonight is purely coincidental.
I don’t usually look for ninas until I’ve finished but I was quite relieved to spot this one early enough to help with a couple of corners … I needed the help!
I’ve found that most of their songs can be sung with the words:
“Repetitive! Repetitive! Our songs are repetitive!”
Yes, but isn’t that rock ‘n’ roll? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love the lyrics of Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen and especially Bob Dylan, but it’s rarely singalong stuff. I’m not claiming that Scouting For Girls are The Beatles, or The Clash, or The Smiths, or Arctic Monkeys, but if a song like “It’s Not About You” doesn’t resonate with you then you need to get out more.
Don’t get me wrong. I like them despite the repetiveness of their songs, just as I like the Red Hot Chili Peppers despite the fact that they keep recycling the same song!
Scouting for girls on the top and bottom lines of the grid helped on this one.