In the preamble for the ‘END OF THE LINE’, proXimal tells us that: “eight song titles associated with a group are given only as word lengths within clues; solvers must deduce the full titles in order to arrive at the answers. Eleven clues contain a misprint in the definition part that must be corrected before solving; in clue order the correct letters give a hint as to which grid entry must be changed to reveal a ninth song title.” So…there aren’t that many ‘groups’ out there are there? (by which, I mean ‘popular beat combos’, m’lud.) Just a small spectrum, from ABBA to ZZ Top…via Bob Marley (or Bruce Springsteen, or Betty Boo), Chris Rea (or Coldplay), Dire Straits, Erasure (or ELO), Fleetwood Mac, Genesis, etc. to X-Ray Specs, Yazz and the Plastic Population…OK, so I may have given a few clues there as to my age and ‘tastes’…but will I be on the same wavelength as proXimal?…
After staring at the song enumerations in the clues for a while, thinking I was smart enough to get it just from these, I resorted to the tried and trusted method of trying to solve as many ‘normal’ clues as I could, to get some leverage into the theme.
And, luckily for me, there was a quite early PDM, when I had FLOGGER, RIPE, QANAT and EXPORT going down in the top left corner, and worked out that (7,5) must be a ‘dancing’ QUEEN to make FREQUENT. So, we are at the earlier (earliest?) end of that spectrum…the ouevre of 70’s/80’s supergroup, ABBA…
After that, most of this fell into place quite smoothly – like some sort of late-70s-early-80s montage…which kind of fits my demographic, if not my publicly confessed playlist…
There were some wonderful weavings of song titles into clues/solutions – MONEY MONEY MONEY into MAMMON (although my first instinct was ‘GIMME GIMME GIMME’…nice misdirection!). TAKE A CHANCE (dice) ON ME for ME-DICE-AN. Thank-you (TA) for the music (DISCO) in discounted to TAUNTED.
But, I digress… on to the denouément…there were some (eleven) misprinted letters in clues, which revealed themselves as ‘BICENTENARY’, and which can’t have escaped the notice of many in the build up of recent days/weeks to this puzzle…15A was NAPOLEON, who suffered a small ‘reverse’ 200 years ago at WATERLOO (which is, coincidentally, the ‘END OF THE LINE’ for me, for about 200 days a year, on my daily commute to work):
So, in the end, a reasonably gentle (for me, at least) and hugely enjoyable EV – maybe helped by the huge media puffery around this bicentenary event and, more cruciverbally relevantly, the recent ABBA-themed Paul crossword in the Grauniad. We shall find out on Sunday who is the WINNER who TAKES IT ALL…I HAVE A DREAM that it might be me…or at least ONE OF US!
The only title I wasn’t familiar with was ‘HAPPY NEW YEAR’ at 26D, but all the others are on ‘ABBA Gold’, which is their only appearance in my collection, and which provided the backing track to typing up the blog this evening, on the way home from Waterloo…
To paraphrase (with apologies to Bjorn, Frida, Benny and Agnetha)…
“I’m nothing special, in fact I’m a bit of a (crossword) bore…if I tell a joke, you’ve probably heard it before…but I have a talent (obsession?), a wonderful thing…’cos everyone listens (I wish!), when I start to blog…I’m so grateful and proud…all I want is to blog it out loud….so I say thank-you (to proXimal) for the puzzle…the clues I’m parsing…thanks for all the joy they’re giving…who can live without it?…I ask in all honesty…what would life be…without an EV (or an Inquisitor?), what are we?…so I say ‘thank you’ (to all setters) for the puzzles…for giving them to us…”
NB. I couldn’t work out the parsing of what I assume is DRESDEN at 23D, so grateful for any enlightenment there…(Thanks to Mike Denton for the explanation below)
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clue No | Solution/ Entry |
Song title/ Misprint |
Clue (definition underlined, misprinted word in bold) / Logic/Parsing |
|
| 1 | FREQUENT | DANCING QUEEN | (7,5) in van, not on to patronise (8) / FR(ON)_T (van, front, without ON) around EQUEN (anag, i.e. dancing, of QUEEN) |
|
| 6 | RAMP | climB | Musician’s words about ultimately warm clime (4) / RA_P (musician’s words) around M (ultimate letter of warM) |
|
| 9 | LILAC | Calculation can be derived from toucan this colour in flight (5) / subtractive anagram – i.e. in flight – of CAL(CU)L(AT)I(ON) minus the letters of TOUCAN |
||
| 11 | ME-TOO | Nothing is right in railway system being imitative (5) / MET(R)O (railway system) with O (nothing) for R (right) |
||
| 13 | OPEN UP | Disclose writer’s employed in publishing house (6, two words) / O_UP (Oxford University Press, publishing house) around (employing) PEN (writer) |
||
| 14 | ABBESS | Devoted lady’s letter to replace last character in pop group (6) / ABB(A) (thematic pop group) with ESS (letter S) replacing last character |
||
| 15 | NAPOLEON/WATERLOO | coIn | Name a European applied to corn (8) / N (name) + A + POLE (European) + ON (applied to) |
|
| 16 | GUITAR | Viol, one sailor’s stringed instrument (6) / GU (viol) + I (one) + TAR (sailor) |
||
| 18 | SQUARE | exaCt | Exalt person of boringly traditional taste (6) / double defn. SQUARE can mean exact, and also a boringly traditional person |
|
| 22 | TAUNTED | THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC | (5,3,3,3,5), discounted and derided (7) / (DISCO)UNTED with TA (thank-you) replacing (for) DISCO (the music) |
|
| 24 | RAILING | Barrier poorly put on radius (7) / R (radius) + AILING (poor) |
||
| 27 | AMPERE | VOULEZ-VOUS | (6-4) could be an offer for this expert on current recording (6) / &lit-ish/cryptic definition. André Marie Ampere was a French physicist, specialising in measuring electricity (expert on current recording) – and ‘Voulez-vous…?’ (Do you want to…?) is an offer in French |
|
| 29 | ATTUNE | tEmper | Tamper, rewriting most of 22 (6) / ATTUNE is an anagram (rewriting) of most of TAUNTEd (22A) |
|
| 31 | LADYS MAN | Youth (non-English), obedient follower, one popular with females (8, two words) / LAD (youth) + Y(E)S-MAN (obedient follower, without E, English – i.e. non-English) |
||
| 33 | POORER | Needier | Gaze taking in old rector being seedier (6) / PO(O)RE (gaze, or PORE, taking in O – old) + R (rector) |
|
| 35 | PERNOD | Tipple | Adept salesman’s inverted nipple (6) / DON (adept, expert – Antiipodean usage?) + REP (salesman) – all inverted |
|
| 36 | INULA | Cicero’s block of buildings with special shed for plant (5) / IN(S)ULA (antique Roman, hence ‘Cicero’s’, for ‘block of buildings’) without (shedding) S (special) |
||
| 37 | BOYLE | Songstress reported to be hot (5) / homophone – (Susan) BOYLE, female singer, sounds like BOIL (to be hot) |
||
| 38 | CITY | Wellington’s one deficiency is to scratch scar (4) / (SCAR)CITY (deficiency) without (scratching) SCAR |
||
| 39 | MEDICEAN | TAKE A CHANCE ON ME | (4,1,6,2,2), one belonging to Italian family (8) / ME + DICE (take a chance) + AN (one) |
|
| Down | ||||
| Clue No | Solution/ Entry |
Song title/ Misprint |
Clue (definition underlined, misprinted word in bold) / Logic/Parsing |
|
| 1 | FLOGGER | bEater | Boater’s fine on recorder (7) / F (fine) + LOGGER (recorder) |
|
| 2 | RIPE | Strong-smelling offal preparation’s no starter (4) / (T)RIPE (offal preparation, without its ‘starter’) |
||
| 3 | QANAT | Brown solution stuck up drainage pipe (5) / TAN (brown) + AQ (aqueous, solution, chemistry) – all ‘stuck up’ |
||
| 4 | EXPORT/EXPERT | Strong beer urge – pressure for husband (6) / EX(H)ORT (urge), with P (pressure) swapped for H (husband) |
||
| 5 | NEALS/NEARS | Toughens lane’s ground (5) / anag (i.e. ground) of LANES |
||
| 6 | REBOUND | Lashed again? Recover quickly (7) / double defn. If something is lashed (tied down) again, it could be RE-BOUND; and to recover quickly is to REBOUND |
||
| 7 | ATE | diNed | Disregarding the odds, fatties dived (3) / even letters (odds disregarded) of fAtTiEs |
|
| 8 | POSSE | SOS | Band’s medley of (3) in uplifting recording (5) / P_E (EP, extended play, rcording, uplifted) around OSS (anag, i.e. medley, of SOS) |
|
| 10 | LENIS/LEWIS | Difficult line soprano effortlessly articulated (5) / LENI (anag, i.e. difficult, of LINE) + S (soprano) |
||
| 12 | OSPREY | Bird disheartened obvious target (6) / OS (disheartened ObviouS) + PREY (target) |
||
| 17 | AMIR | Prince song entertains millions (4) / A_IR (song) around (entertaining) M (millions) |
||
| 19 | QUIT | CHIQUITITA | Sample of (10) is clear (4) / hidden word in (i.e. sample of) ‘chiQUITita’ |
|
| 20 | MAMMON | MONEY, MONEY, MONEY | (5,5,5) about about about this? (6) / &lit-ish/CD? M_MM (Mony, Money, Money) around (first ‘about’) A (second ‘about’) + ON (third ‘about’!) |
|
| 21 | CLEARLY | Without difficulty, the Parisian gets in Lycra pants (7) / C_ARLY (anag, i.e. pants!) of LYCRA around LE (the in French, i.e. ‘the’ Parisian) |
||
| 23 | DRESDEN | Poet’s yard taken over by opponents somewhere in Germany (7) / |
||
| 25 | GASPED | pAnted | Good tip for Aintree racing odds – journalist punted (6) / G (good) + A (tip, of first letter, of Aintree) + SP (startomg price, racing odds) + ED (editor, journalist) |
|
| 26 | SUNNY | HAPPY NEW YEAR | (5,3,4) in support of students uprising (5) / SUN (NUS, National Union of Students, rising) + NY (new year) |
|
| 27 | ASPIC | Bandage has lower end raised to reveal mould (5) / SPIC(A) – bandage, with last letter (lower end) raised to the top |
||
| 28 | EYRIE | bRood | Blood from organ pierced by two thirds of bone (5) / EY_E (bodily organ) around (pirced by) RI(B) (two thirds of rib, or bone) |
|
| 30 | TAROC | Coco Chanel’s opening card (5) / TARO (coco, or edda, edible root/tuber) + C (opening letter of Chanel) |
||
| 32 | ZOLA | Naturalist left to feed individual creatures (4) / ZO_A (plural of zoon, individual creature) around (fed by) L (left) |
||
| 34 | OUT | gaY | Loud sound cutting the quiet, openly declared as gas (3) / (SH)OUT (loud sound, without SH – quiet) |
|
Despite not being a big Abba fan (I think the Alan Partridge Abba medley finished me off totally as far as the Swedish popsters are concerned), I liked this an enormous amount. I particularly enjoyed the weaving of the titles into the clues.
Excellent blog, as well. I parsed DRESDEN as DRYDEN with ES (bridge opponents) in place of Y (yard). If I don’t win the prize, mc rapper, I hope you do!
Thanks, Mike Denton at #1 – you are a SUPER TROUPER (;+>)