One of Morph’s occasional and very welcome contributions, not that it was easy. It took me at any rate a long time.
The only — very mild — criticism is that ER appears twice, in 10ac as ‘royal’, and in 8dn as ‘ruler’.
Definitions in maroon, underlined.
I thought something must be afoot because of the unusual grid, with all those unches round the sides. But they amounted to nothing so far as I can see.
The Nina is in the six Across rows, where you can find red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Just the sort of Nina that appeals to me: fairly easily seen and that is that (I think). None of this endless finding more and more things in the grid.
| Across | ||
| 7 | PAINT THE TOWN RED | Partied without restraint on 20th, out to do this? (5,3,4,3) |
| (par{tie}d on twentieth)* — the anagram indicated by ‘out’ | ||
| 9 | APPEAL TO | Mimic voice holding power to attract (6,2) |
| a(p)pe alto | ||
| 10 | RANGER | Summoned royal forester (6) |
| rang ER | ||
| 11 | YELLOWED | A while back you m-made a beastly noise and turned pale (8) |
| ye [= a little while back you] l-lowed | ||
| 13 | TOTALS | Destroys what’s built to last (6) |
| (to last)* — not a word anyone seemed to use in my youth, but one that has become farirly widespread recently. I suspect it comes from America, but Collins says that it’s only the vehicular sense that is American; the doing damage to people sense is not | ||
| 15 | GREEN WOODPECKER | Al who sings, Ronnie who plays guitar and Dick who drums (5,10) |
| [singer and songwriter Al] Green, Ronnie Wood [of the Rolling Stones] and one of the hundreds of words for … | ||
| 18 | FELLOW | Peer collapsed with pained sound (6) |
| fell ow! | ||
| 20 | NAVY BLUE | Tone going round Brussels and Luxembourg in transit, perhaps, (4,4) |
| (EU L by van)rev. — EU = Brussels seems a stretch, but perhaps it’s OK | ||
| 22 | BHINDI | Indian side perhaps lagging after English got out, on one (6) |
| b{E}hind 1 — Indian side dish | ||
| 24 | GOT ON TOP | Mounted Republicans surrounding 10’s partner (3,2,3) |
| GO(Tonto)P — this one, unlike 7ac although that didn’t stop me from thinking that it did, needed the solution of the number in the clue, and that was not rapidly forthcoming — the Republicans are the Grand Old Party or the GOP | ||
| 25 | SHRINKING VIOLET | Madly in love with Romeo, knight is one unwilling to make the first move? (9,6) |
| (in love R knight is)* | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | UNDERLIE | Support collapsing rule in East Germany (8) |
| (rule in E D)* | ||
| 2 | AT A LOW | A type of candle half-heartedly burnt down further than before? (2,1,3) |
| a tal{l}ow | ||
| 3 | HERO | She’s possessive with love for leading man (4) |
| Her [= She’s possessive] 0 | ||
| 4 | DOORSTEP | Regular letters from court posted carelessly around – found on this? (8) |
| {c}o{u}r{t} in (posted)* | ||
| 5 | UNKNOT | Loosen damaged nut securing handle incompletely (6) |
| (nut)* round kno{b} | ||
| 6 | CEDE | Surrender as top player declared (4) |
| “seed” | ||
| 8 | APPLE TREE | Computer program eastern ruler backed that should bear fruit (5,4) |
| applet (E ER)rev. | ||
| 12 | DROWN | Overcome, doctor gets personal (5) |
| Dr own | ||
| 14 | LAEVULOSE | Meat’s coming up – what happens if u snooze, sugar? (9) |
| (veal)rev. u lose — this expression was new to me but could be guessed at, but only once I’d looked in a list of sugars to find this one, of which I’d only vaguely heard | ||
| 16 | WAWRINKA | Tennis player opening in Wimbledon with ace – and again, controlling slippery surface (8) |
| W{imbledon} a — this repeated, with rink in the middle of the second Wa — you may well have heard of him, but just in case … | ||
| 17 | CABIN BOY | Sailor favoured barrel in company of youth (5,3) |
| C(AB in b)oy | ||
| 19 | LENTIL | Endlessly sick following fast food from vegan place? (6) |
| lent il{l} | ||
| 21 | VOTIVE | Dropping behind in referendum, say, one’s undertaken to fulfil promise (6) |
| vot{e} I’ve | ||
| 23 | HA-HA | Ditch Norwegian band after number two in chart (2-2) |
| {c}h{art} A ha — if you don’t know your Norwegian groups, this tells you about A-ha | ||
| 24 | GUNK | Perhaps discharge firearm in front of king (4) |
| gun K | ||
*anagram
I loved it – I spotted the Nina too – My particular favourite amongst all the fun was 15a which took Mr CS and I together to work out the ‘parts’ (in more ways than one 😉 )
Thanks to both Morph and John
I loved it too, but (of course) missed the nina.
Thanks Morph and John.
I’ll buy 22’s definition – to be fair, you generally find it under ‘Side Dishes’, but FWIW I love the things so much I always order bhindi as a main dish.
Good fun, with the colours of the rainbow in order as a Nina adding a nice touch. Didn’t know the expression for 14d either, so invented a new sugar called ‘laevudoze’. Vainly tried to remember if I’d ever heard of a a drummer called Dick Pecker. Must be my sheltered childhood.
Thanks to Morph and John.
Quite a struggle today. BHINDI was our LOI after a vain google for sides in the Indian Premier League and Super League left us using a wordfinder.
SHRINKING VIOLET was our CoD – once we had worked out exactly what the anagram fodder was. APPLE TREE was good, too, with its ambiguity at first glance – we guessed the answer and then had to work out whether the computer (+ program) bit was ‘app’, ‘apple’ or ‘applet’.
A minor grumble about NAVY BLUE in that by (the admittedly illogical) convention ‘transit’ should have had an initial capital, although we acknowledge that it could have made the clue too obvious and it would be difficult to recast the clue to begin with ‘Transit’.
Thanks, Morph and John.
Enjoyed what I did of this, but didn’t do so well on the solving front what with being out of practice.
My poor performance also meant I missed the theme, which would’ve helped me on a great deal had I nailed it, natch. Lots to like here with 15a being my firm fave even though I didn’t get it (though should’ve).
Cheers to The Plasticine Man for the puzz and to The Facilities for the blog.
Delectable stuff. My favourite has to be 15a, but there were many other bits to savour. And I even spotted the nina. Many thanks to Morph and John.
You are right John – we don’t see enough of Morph.
Failed on BHINDI, but have stored it away for future reference, both when dining out and for the next cryptic in which it appears. LAEVULOSE was good once I’d convinced myself that there was no such sugar as FEEBULOSE. It’s another name for FRUCTOSE and I should have remembered that.
Saw there were a few colours in there but the colours of the rainbow in order would have passed me by even on a good Nina-spotting day.
Well done Morph, and thanks to John for blogging.
First time I’ve attempted a Morph puzzle and I certainly didn’t find it easy.
Needed John’s input to parse 20a & 17d and both 14&16d were new to me.
Loved 15a and that was my outright winner.
Thanks to Morph and to John for the most informative review.
Very enjoyable, thanks Morph.
Lovely nina and some great humour. Of course I liked GREEN WOODPECKER, but I also really liked GOT ON TOP.
Many thanks John for the parsing of DOORSTEP and the tennis player who I gave up on.
Well, I finished it, but it was a bit of a slog, and I needed lots of electronic help.
It wasn’t until the puzzle was complete that we spotted the nina. Had we done so it woukd have helped us with 22 and 16. Thankfully the app we use to solve it shows up incorrect letters in red – very helpful for 14d and 16.
Great fun though so thanks Morph – more please.
Thanks John.