August is with us, as is a puzzle from Knut.
A touch of a musical theme and a few clues that required some general knowledge facts to crack.
Highly enjoyable Thanks Knut
Favourite clue had to be 8/15 closely followed by 12. The former for the image of Freddie Mercury at the wheel of a Transit van! The second for the cheekiness.
Key * anagram, dd double definition, rev. Reverse, underline definition
Across
1 Streaks round across front of nudist beach (6)
Rev. darts (streaks) around n (front of nudist) = STRAND
5 Old Tyler wearing the tartan; it’s a power thing (8)
Kilt (tartan) around o (old) + Wat (Tyler) = KILOWATT
9 Latest opinion is to place the Head on leave (4,4)
Poll (head) after exit (leave) = EXIT POLL
10 Agreed Kelly has unusual piercing (6)
Ned (Kelly) around odd (unusual) = NODDED
11 Fixing wiretaps on US secret agent (6,6)
(wiretaps on us)* = AUSTIN POWERS
13 Insipid interior of Puebla Hotel (4)
Hidden PueBLA Hotel = BLAH
14 Emergency procedure with Oscar Alpha coming in to land! (2-6)
Ground (land) around O (Oscar) + a (alpha) = GO-AROUND
17 Acne irks – applied moisturiser? (8)
(acne irks)* = SKINCARE
18 Post Neeson rejected (4)
Rev. Liam (Neeson) = MAIL
20 Came to a point about my 24 answerphone? (4,8)
Tapered (ame to a point) around cor (my) + Er (Queen) = TAPE RECORDER
23 Get runs following Fish Curry? (6)
R (runs) after skate (fish) = SKATER (as in John Curry)
24 It follows; after disco, nurse makes toast (3,5)
Theque(after disco) + en (nurse) = THE QUEEN
25 Approach vast rat Egyptian’s trapped (8)
Hidden vaST RAT EGYptian = STRATEGY
26 Beckett character’s retiring, having a yen to visit Chihuahua (3,3)
Rev. Godot (Beckett’s character) around y (yen) = TOY DOG
Down
2 Uber turning up at 11 (4)
Rev. at + XI (11) = TAXI
3 American star Hank modelled Russian fur (9)
(star Hank)* = ASTRAKHAN
4 Tired, raising weapon last thing on Friday (6)
Rev. sword (weapon) + y last thing on Friday = DROWSY
5 Record success on the stock market (FTSE) with Moly trading (7,2,6)
Killing (success on the stock market) + (FTSE + moly)* = KILLING ME SOFTLY
6 Album featuring a bit too much drama? (4,4)
DD LONG PLAY
7 Mayfair party with Veuve Cliquot? (5)
WI (Mayfair) + do (party) + w (with) = WIDOW (Veuve is French for widow)
8/15 24 bandwagon back in the day, an occasional feature on the front of The Sun? (3,7,2,7)
DD referring to Freddie Mercury of Queen’s transit van! THE TRANSIT OF MERCURY
12 Protective covering – could be for 5D, by the sound of it (4,6)
5D record by Roberta Flack covering = FLAK JACKET
15 See 8
16 United, Delta flying from Auld Reekie turning over water (4,4)
(Auld Reekie – ud)* = LAKE ERIE
19 Commercial diamonds smuggled by State Head of Transport (6)
Aver (state) around d (diamonds) + t (Head of Transport) = ADVERT
21 More Artex mixture! (5)
(Artex)* = EXTRA
22 Turn over telly screening English opener Boycott (4)
Rev. o(over) + tv (telly) around e (English opener) = VETO
Dear Twencelas,
Thanks for your blog. I’m sorry for the typo in Clicquot – a daft error since my own name is French and has a cq stuck in it.
In fact, Eimi asked for a few corrections in the puzzle which don’t seem to have been uploaded to the online version.
Best wishes, Rob/Knut
I always enjoy a Knut crossword and this one was no exception – I was held up the longest by 24a
Thanks to Knut for the fun and Twencelas for the blog
Thanks for the explanation of 12d. I got 5d entirely from the word play and didn’t know the record. Therefore I had no idea Roberta Flack was involved.
However, even I knew there was a group called Queen which had a singer called Freddie Mercury.
Really enjoyed this. Thank you, Rob and twencelas.
I also enjoyed this.
In the early Seventies (yes, to those who don’t know who Roberta Flack is) almost 40 years ago 5dn was a huge hit, even covered by Frank Sinatra (whoever that is). She had another one chart topper (First Time Ever I Saw Your Face), a song that probably would upset my solving partner as she just lost her mother.
Like others I loved the imagery of Queen using a van going from gig to gig. They surely must have done that at some point before they ruled the world.
In 23ac Knut has ‘Curry’ in uppercase, and, yes, he should. Good to see him capitalising ‘Fish’ too.
Perhaps, it looks a bit odd but it is as it should be from a cryptic POV.
My last one in was THE QUEEN (24ac).
I am not familiar being it a ‘toast’ but, after I looked it up, I got it.
I think the definition is just ‘toast’ and not ‘makes toast’.
And THEQUE is coming from ‘it follows after disco’ I assume, otherwise the inclusion of ‘it follows after’ doesn’t make much sense.
I know that Knut likes his semicolons and I also know that punctuation often should be ignored.
However, when punctuation interrupts the wordplay in an inappropriate way (as it is the case here, IMO), well, then I’m off.
Altogether though, a crossword that has a less stuffy feeling when compared to many of his colleagues.
And that’s why I like Knut (and Morph and Tyrus).
Many thanks to twencelas for blogging.
Very enjoyable, lots of very clever stuff. Last in THE QUEEN, don’t know how much longer it would have taken me did I not have all the crossers, as the THEQUE bit had me stumped, even tried to look it up as a word before it clicked.
Thanks much to Knut and to twencelas for the blog.
Nice!
Clue for 24 across was different in the version of this puzzle my newspaper (The Statesman, Delhi) published: Royal follower of disco de-stocking Ed Sheeran (3,5). One of the changes you had wanted, Rob/Knut @1?
@h.eckler
Yes, that was indeed in the second/amended version – thanks for pointing it out
Yes, much better clue.
Pity this version didn’t make it here [but that’s how it sometimes goes, doesn’t it?