There is a quite well-known setter who never so far as I can see sets a crossword with more than 28 clues in it. Quite sensible in my opinion: he is being paid for setting a crossword and the payment doesn’t go up if there are more clues than normal. Yet this one has 35 clues. What has prompted Knut to be so profligate? Something must be going on that requires this number of clues.
But I can’t see it. Everything is normal so far as I can see, a not terribly difficult but very pleasant crossword; there is evidently some reference to Ken Dodd but I’m not an expert on him so have surely missed some of it: my knowledge goes so far as to know that Knotty Ash featured with him a bit, and in his act he had a tickling (31ac) stick (32ac). I suspect the jam butty (4ac) was involved.
Definitions underlined in maroon. Anagram indicators in italics.
| Across | ||
| 1 | DELTA | River mouth? It could be Shannon, thanks (5) |
| Del ta — Del Shannon | ||
| 4 | JAM BUTTY | Sticky sandwich to stuff still empty tummy (3,5) |
| jam but t{umm}y | ||
| 9 | DIS | Vicious setback for underworld figure (3) |
| (Sid)rev. — Sid Vicious | ||
| 10 | CUM | Combined with copper money (3) |
| Cu M | ||
| 11 | RISOTTO | Ferdinand downing very dry Italian favourite (7) |
| Ri(so TT)o — Rio Ferdinand | ||
| 12 | EATS | Each time, special grub (4) |
| ea. t s | ||
| 13 | FUNCTIONAL | Contain flu outbreak – it’s working (10) |
| (Contain flu)* | ||
| 15 | KNOCK | Thump Kelvin’s ugly conk (5) |
| K (conk)* — K is an abbreviation for Kelvin, the SI base unit of temperature | ||
| 16 | KNOTTY ASH | Difficult to get deposit for a place in Liverpool (6,3) |
| knotty [= difficult] ash [= deposit] | ||
| 18 | NIGHTGOWN | Late replacement for evening dress? (9) |
| CD: a nightgown is worn later than an evening dress | ||
| 22 | NOMAD | A wanderer, Matt’s heading west (5) |
| (Damon)rev. — Matt Damon | ||
| 24 | HAUGHTIEST | Most high and mighty at this huge gathering (10) |
| (at this huge)* | ||
| 25 | JERK | Queen escorted by her neighbours from deck in tug (4) |
| J(ER)K — the neighbours of Queen in a deck of cards are Jack and King | ||
| 28 | PIANOLA | Lad from Liverpool, at first softly, a churner-out of music (7) |
| So far as I can see it’s piano [= softly] la’, where la’ = lad spoken in a Liverpool accent (although this seems a bit thin) — at first this seemed to be a reference to Ian Rush, who played football for Liverpool, but how then to account for the ‘ola’? Churner-out because one turns a handle on a pianola. | ||
| 29 | ERA | Time for Gunners to follow up Emirates’ opener (3) |
| E{mirates} RA — fits together nicely since The Gunners (Arsenal) play at the Emirates Stadium | ||
| 30 | TED | Regularly attends influential talks (3) |
| {a}t{t}e{n}d{s} — ref. TED talks | ||
| 31 | TICKLING | That’s funny (in intergalactic Klingon) (8) |
| Hidden in intergalacTIC KLINGon | ||
| 32 | STICK | Beginning to sniff instant glue (5) |
| s{niff} tick | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | DODGE | Upset, say, Sir Ken’s endless scam (5) |
| (eg Dod{d})rev. — I don’t know what the turnround time is for these crosswords: Ken Dodd’s death was announced on 11th March; possibly the allusion was just a coincidence, but probably not: over a week is plenty of time for an experienced setter | ||
| 2 | LESOTHO | Drunk in awful hole somewhere in Africa (7) |
| sot in (hole)* | ||
| 3 | ARCH | Chief section of the foot (4) |
| 2 defs | ||
| 4 | JUMBUCK | Jack – how can I put this? – Rogers sheep in Australia (7) |
| J um Buck [as in Buck Rogers] — jumbuck is an Australian word for sheep; now that explains that word in Waltzing Matilda whose meaning I never knew |
||
| 5 | MOROCCO | Country cricket club on no runs after second run-out (7) |
| (CC 0) after mo. [= second] RO | ||
| 6 | UNSTINTING | Full, hazy sun suffusing colour (10) |
| (sun)* tinting | ||
| 7 | TITANIA | Oberon’s wife isn’t commonly up and about at one (7) |
| (ain'(at 1)t)rev. — I’m not quite convinced here, since the reversal of (at 1) seems to be a bit vague: the clue means ‘… isn’t commonly about at one up’, but does it say so? | ||
| 8 | WOOLSHED | Lewd Soho burlesque in which Shearer strips 4D? (8) |
| (Lewd Soho)* — nothing to do with Alan Shearer, but the place where a sheep-shearer strips sheep [= jumbuck, 4dn] | ||
| 14 | SKETCHBOOK | Comedy writer’s block? (10) |
| CD, using the facts that a comedy writer writes sketches and a sketchbook is a pad | ||
| 15 | KINSHIPS | Family bonds at home in Cambodia’s fashionable society (8) |
| K'(in)s hip S — K is Cambodia, in = at home, hip = fashionable | ||
| 17 | NEW | Modern, seething city is revolting (3) |
| (wen)rev. | ||
| 19 | GOURAMI | Fish filling our Amish nets (7) |
| Hidden in fillinG OUR AMIsh, ‘nets’ the inclusion indicator | ||
| 20 | ORIGAMI | Folding old uniform for a mate in Paris (7) |
| o rig ami [French for friend] — origami is paper-folding | ||
| 21 | NEST EGG | Mum abandoned old Welsh pit town; no good banking savings (4,3) |
| n({Ma}esteg)g | ||
| 23 | MAESTRI | Running up shirt seams to dress top musicians (7) |
| Hidden rev. in shIRT SEAMs — ‘to dress’ the inclusion indicator | ||
| 26 | KODAK | Film company has overdraft; in the smelly stuff by the sound of it (5) |
| k(o/d)ak — kak = “kack” | ||
| 27 | MARS | Missus taking in a bar? (4) |
| M(a)rs | ||
*anagram
What would Bobby Chariot make of this? is he still living in the back of the jag taking pills for his nurves?
A jolly fun romp this.Thanks =John and Knut
PS SID Vicious SYD Barrett.RIP both.
Thanks John. Knut does superb tribute puzzles doesn’t he.
For Twitter users he flagged this one up with a poignant valediction:
Farewell to Spooner’s crazy neckwear (5-3)
RIP Doddy, and chapeau Knut.
Don’t know too much about Ken Dodd other than what was written about him last week but even that little bit helped with KNOTTY ASH. Yes, there probably are other references which I’ve missed.
I couldn’t parse RISOTTO and had never heard of TED talks or GOURAMI, but otherwise I found this fairly kind. Good to see MARS bar and JAM BUTTY encouraging us solvers to follow the paths of nutritional correctness.
Do KODAK make film any more?
Thank you to Knut and John
Thanks, John. Can’t add to what Conrad said. – lovely.
Thanks Knut and John
I wasn’t going to attempt the Indy today, but when I saw it was Knut I changed my mind. Delightted at once with DELTA.
All fun. It didn’t take long, though I also hadn’t heard of TED TALKS, or “kack” either.
Although I wouldn’t have spotted it if it hadn’t been pointed out, five Across answers can be combined to create a related word
Found this to be the easiest Knut ever. Quiptic level I thought, but enjoyable. The only tricky one was PIANOLA, which I couldn’t parse without ‘at first’ doing double duty referring to L (Liverpool at first) and the placing of P at the start (taking Ian as the lad and O from o’ , I.e. of). This is too convoluted, so your parsing must be correct though I wasn’t aware of la’ as lad in Liverpool. Hopefully Knut will explain.
Thanks to Knut and John.
Oh and thanks to eimi@6. That Dodd Reference passed me by. Those not aware ‘discomknockerated’ and ‘tattyfilarious’ were two of Doddy’s favourite words.
hi folks,
Thanks for the blog John and to those who have commented. There are a few more clues than usual, it’s true…the grid is very much a home-made job to accommodate the DIS CUM KNOCK ERA TED gag. I always think that a grid with perimeter lights and so many shortish entries is bound to be at the easy end so I’m not surprised by the “quiptic” comparison. I’m sorry if it was over in a rush.
The intended parsing for PIANOLA is PIANO (softly) before la’ (the Merseyside treatment of lad) as John surmised.
I hope my friends in the area will have noticed the dig at Mr. MacKenzie at 15a.
@wordplodder…the recent plight of Kodak and its highly-leveraged business model was the idea behid the surface.
I wasn’t much of a Doddy fan myself but my dear mama was; and as it’s International Happiness Day (it sez on Twitter), after three everyone:
Happiness, happiness
the greatest gift
that I possess…
regards to all, Rob/Knut
Splendid – thank you to Knut and RIP Doddy
A most enjoyable, if straightforward puzzle. Enjoyed the Doddy references, but missed discumknockerated. Didn’t see the parsing of PIANOLA, and didn’t know TED Talks. Thanks Knut and John.
Fun and topical puzzle. Thanks to S&B.
Very enjoyable puzzle.
Knut is certainly the go-to guy for the very topical stuff.
Thanks Knut. I didn’t know diconknockerated, but I did suspect there was something going on with dis cum and era ted. Thanks Eimi@6 and hovis@8 for explaining. I did find the jam butty, knotty ash and tickling stick references.
I was familiar with and hence happy with the Ted talks. I foolishly vowed to give one once, another of life’s unfulfilled promises.
I thought JerK was neat. Deck in tug mislead me, some nautical term? I was thinking of chess neighbours which lead me to berk, not good. The clue might still have been fair without “in deck”.
Anyway much fun so thanks again, and thanks John for pianola and unstinting
The left hand side went in much quicker than the right hand side. I think Knut is right, the grid lends itself to an easier puzzle. Which is totally fine.
I laughed at 8d/4d
Went in fairly quickly, although I probably didn’t parse everything as I was going.
I was a fan of Dodd’s TV and radio shows back in the sixties. I never saw him live but some friends went to one of his marathon four-hour shows which was apparently great fun. My brother was telling me at Christmas that he’d just booked to see Dodd in Darlington next month. The booking came with the warning that the management could not guarantee what time the show would end, and was subject to Dodd’s health.
I did wonder if 21dn was a reference to the revelation in Dodd’s tax case that he kept large quantities of cash around his house as he didn’t trust banks.
Dormouse @ 15
De mortuis etc, but what the hell…
“didn’t trust banks” is more understatement than somewhat. After 1D I was desperately trying to parse TAX in 30. Sadly, I couldn’t…
Thanks Knut, John
Fast work, again.
Generous clues today. SKETCHBOOK very good, other likes LESOTHO, KNOCK, FUNCTIONAL, and also the (who cares if it’s a) capital R for Rogers. I was confused when DIS and CUM didn’t go anywhere I could see, but I know nothing of Ken Dodd except for tax.
Thanks Knut, awesome as usual for your timeliness. (I suspect you have a Tardis in the cellar). Enjoyed the theme and wondered what the “something-erated” could be.
I loved the Queen’s neighbours clue. Brilliance.
Only just caught up with this one, but it is a lovely tribute…