That was a workout. Really hard work at times, and with 34 clues, some of which were uncomfortably long and took ages to parse, the whole thing took me a good while. But there were some clever clues, at times apparently original.
The matter of length of clues I’m not sure about. My own taste is for the pithy, and Dean Mayer for example in his long session where he set a crossword, said at some point as a putative clue was getting up to 9 words, that that was too long. But Azed in his ‘slips’ after his clue-setting competitions publishes some clues that seem to me to be ludicrously long, yet in his own crosswords the word-count of a clue seldom reaches 12.
Definitions in maroon, underlined. Anagram indicators in italics.
I felt that something clever was going on here. But what?
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | ROLLBAR | Two of Barbirolli’s pieces reversed in order? It might have saved someone turning over (7) |
| Bar{bi}roll{i} gives the two pieces of Barbirolli; reverse them in order and you get roll bar — all the Google hits seem to refer to the software, but in the old days (hence the past tense) it was something to stop you from falling over (says he confidently: actually it may be something to do with racing cars) | ||
| 5 | DUCHESS | Meghan Markle’s ranking of the French musical (7) |
| du Chess | ||
| 9 | BLACK | Illicit sort of coffee bar (5) |
| 3 defs | ||
| 10 | LAST OF ALL | City star’s beginning to decline, finally (4,2,3) |
| LA s{tar} to fall | ||
| 11 | FRIED | Unnamed mate, exhausted or drunk? (5) |
| frie{n}d — two different senses of the answer | ||
| 12 | RICH | Flush fully or partly (after No.1 only) (4) |
| I can’t quite explain what type of clue this is: flush = rich, and if you take No.1, the first letter, away, you get ‘lush’, which is another meaning of ‘rich’ | ||
| 13 | LUX | Unit of flow (not force) (3) |
| {f}lux — the lux is the SI derived unit of illuminance | ||
| 15 | LEGATO | Smooth Italian ice cream setter sent back (6) |
| gelato with just the first three letters (setter) reversed — this parsing initially defeated me: I shrugged and thought that there was a make of Italian ice cream called Ota, so that it was (Ota gel)rev. — and first of all I had thought that the ‘Smooth’ was part of the definition and the answer was GELATO but discarded that idea fairly quickly since the last three letters wouldn’t be accounted for | ||
| 17 | RUN-IN | Confrontation from start of really loveless marriage? (3-2) |
| r{eally} uni{0}n | ||
| 20 | REIGN | What 4s do badly in Germany? Not a lot (5) |
| (in Ger{many}) — another clue referring to 4, which is ‘ruler’. | ||
| 21 | ATHENS | Capital letters from the outset, if spelling 32 (6) |
| When spelling ‘assured’, which is 32, you begin ‘A then S …’, making ‘Athens’ | ||
| 24 | ACE | A church service (3) |
| a CE — an ace, as in tennis | ||
| 25 | AYER | Philosopher that’s always right (4) |
| aye R — ref A.J. Ayer, who may not be the first philosopher one thinks of, but he was once very well-known. And he often appears in crosswords. | ||
| 27 | OPERA | Works in shop, with no quiet period (5) |
| {sh}op era — the plural of ‘opus’ rather than the musical theatre | ||
| 29 | IN THE WASH | He was thinking about 4 having left dirty clothes here? (2,3,4) |
| (He was thin{king})* — 4 being ‘ruler’ ‘king’ is removed | ||
| 30 | SMITH | Shaping metal’s important to him primarily (5) |
| First letters, &lit. | ||
| 31 | TERRACE | Sat in the car, retweet about housing row (7) |
| Hidden reversed in theE CAR, RETweet | ||
| 32 | ASSURED | Confident like Bob, and frightfully rude (7) |
| as s. *(rude) — the bob is a shilling, which will be well-known to those of a certain age but not to those younger | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | REBUFF | Cut and polish again (6) |
| re-buff — some might have preferred ‘Cut, for example’ or some such | ||
| 2 | LEAVIS | Former critic of the French car rental company (6) |
| Le Avis — like Ayer, F. R. Leavis was famous in his time but not so well-know now | ||
| 3 | BAKED BEANS | Kebabs and enchilada starter surprisingly part of full English breakfast (5,5) |
| (Kebabs and e{nchilada})* | ||
| 4 | RULER | Law 18? It might help to draw the line in 26, we hear (5) |
| 3 defs (or at any rate bits of wordplay): Law 18 might be Rule R, R being the 18th letter of the alphabet; a ruler helps to draw a line; 26 being Ruhla, ‘Ruhla, we hear’ sounds like ‘ruler’ | ||
| 5 | DISHCLOTH | Dryer perhaps containing child’s hot pants (9) |
| (child’s hot)* — surely there’s no need to worry about a definition by example and so say ‘perhaps’: a dishcloth is an example of a dryer, not the other way round | ||
| 6 | COOP | Pen shop (4) |
| 2 defs (it could have said ‘(4 or 2-2)’ but that would have been silly) — perhaps the definition is just ‘Pen’ and the other word is Co-op. which is wordplay | ||
| 7 | ENABLING | Allowing plastic bag in new London emporium initially (8) |
| *(bag in n L{ondon} e{mporium}) | ||
| 8 | SILOXANE | Uplifting section from Springsteen ax? Oli Sykes produces one based on Si-O-Si (8) |
| Hidden rev. in SpringsteEN AX? OLI Sykes — because the words are so odd, I got this without knowing what the answer meant or what it was all about: according to Collins, a siloxane is ‘any of a class of compounds containing alternate silicon and oxygen atoms [hence Si-O-Si: silicon-oxygen-silicon] with the silicon atoms bound to hydrogen atoms or organic groups. Many are highly complex polymers’ — but the surface? All I can establish is that Oli Sykes was a singer-songwriter who was the lead singer of Bring Me the Horizon; no doubt aficionados of this sort of thing will be able to explain | ||
| 14 | IRON HORSES | Metal mounts for steam engines (4,6) |
| iron horses — iron is the metal, horses are the mounts — this was the old term for steam trains when they were first invented | ||
| 16 | AT ANY RATE | When sick, try and eat – with a day off though, whatever may happen (2,3,4) |
| *(try an{d} eat a) | ||
| 18 | ORGANIST | Manual worker given dreadful roasting (8) |
| *(roasting) — the pun is on the manuals of an organ: an organist operates the manuals | ||
| 19 | DIRECTOR | Conduct work after fleecing board member (8) |
| direct {w}or{k} | ||
| 22 | DENIER | One who won’t admit stocking this fine unit? (6) |
| 2 defs, the second one referring to the fact that the thickness of stockings is measured in deniers | ||
| 23 | DASHED | The German conductor’s fourth piece cut by Hallé, without everything getting spoilt (6) |
| das(H{all}é){con}d{uctor} | ||
| 26 | RUHLA | Posts article in French following game somewhere in Germany (5) |
| RU H la — RU is the game, H the posts (think rugby posts) — Ruhla is a town in Germany of which I’d never heard | ||
| 28 | VEGA | Star mostly not eating dairy, meat, fish or eggs (4) |
| vega{n} | ||
RUHLA was a toughie, It parses OK but I’ve never heard of it neither had your average word search including One Look but I googled a list of places in Germany staring with RU knowing it finished in A and there it was with H being posts-an area i missed-wonder what the beer is like (I know there is no bad beer in D but all the same-i was then able to crack IN THE WASH- he’s been very spritely of late
Wasnt bonkers about 11 but it wasnt boring!!
Tough. LEAVIS & RUHLA & SILOXANE unknown. 15a was good – shame I bunged in an unparsed GELATO – drat! Failed to parse RICH.
There’s a mistake in blog for 16d. It is an anagram of TRY AN(D) EAT + A (with A (and) Day off).
In 7d, I took “initially” to apply to “new” also, but either way.
Thanks to S&B.
Agree that was tough – thanks to Hob for the workout. Also hadn’t heard of RUHLA, and couldn’t parse RICH, so thanks John for the explanation.
It’s Tuesday – is there a theme? We can see Cilla BLACK, Patti SMITH, and Suzanne VEGA ….
Forgot it was theme day. I feel that Friedrich must be relevant.
Just seen that Friedrich Lux was born in Ruhla so the theme must be this. Over to those in the know.
Well spotted, Hovis! I’m not ‘in the know’ but Wiki tells me that Lux was an ORGANIST and wrote the OPERA the DUCHESS of ATHENS.
. . . and the BlackSmith of Ruhla.
Gosh this was hard! And a DNF for me: I couldn’t make head nor tale of 8dn and I’d bunged in an unparsed IN ANY CASE at 16dn, which prevented me from seeing LEGATO.
Apart from that, my favourite clues were LAST OF ALL, RUN-IN, REIGN, IN THE WASH, SMITH, TERRACE, BAKED BEANS, ORGANIST and COOP, which made me laugh, because it reminded me of this – a link which I’ve posted here a number of times.
Many thanks to Hob for the challenge and John for the blog.
Yes, very well spotted Hovis! Never heard of FRIED RICH LUX, I’m afraid, but Wikipedia tells me he was born exactly 200 years ago. (And that his only “notable works”, as mentioned by Eileen @6 and Dicho @7, were composed while he was in his 60s, so there’s hope for me yet!)
Failed to parse RICH, and would have got RUHLA quicker if I’d remembered the cross reference in 4d. It was out of sight, out of mind, as I solved this on my iphone. Never bothered to look into what 8d was all about.
me @8 ‘head nor tale’??
I managed to get this out, but there were plenty I couldn’t parse and I didn’t have a hope of seeing the theme – well done Hovis. Anyway, I’ve learnt a bit of European geography and the name of a new composer, so as usual, for a Tuesday Indy, well worth doing.
Thanks to Hob and John
Well that was pretty obscure as a theme. How much easier it would’ve been if The Blacksmith of Ruhla had been on the radio as I was solving. Happens to others but not to me! Again, my experience seems to follow Eileen’s in bunging in IN ANY CASE for 16d having failed to spot the extra A and, whilst both alternatives suggested themselves, I plumped for the wrong one. I’d spotted GELATO but, not being strong on musical terminology, didn’t see the option of LEGATO. So a DNF. (And I see, Eileen, you were not exaggerating when you said you never miss an opportunity to post the Two Ronnies link. It hurtled back to mind when COOP popped up.)
I’d wondered about a breakfast theme and was hoping for Pudding (rather than Cilla) to go with BLACK (which was excellently clued) but it wasn’t to be… My other ticks are almost identical to Eileen’s too so I will eschew my customary listing of favourites. I did need John’s help with quite a bit of parsing today so, although I made decent headway, I’m feeling a bit dim. I did get SILOXANE though but, in the same way as John – “such an odd bit of wordplay it has to be a reverse containment and, yes, that does look a bit like a chemical formula. Bung and hope”
John, a rollbar (perhaps more correctly known as an anti-roll bar but frequently abreviated) is, indeed, a vehicle mechanism designed to prevent roll when cornering. It’s actually a method of cross linking opposite wheels. And incorporated into many suspension systems. You might possibly have also been thinking of a roll cage which is designed to protect occupants of a vehicle that flips over.
Thanks Hob and John
PostMark @ 13
You’ve correctly described an anti-roll bar, which is not the same as a rollbar.
A rollbar is the metal hoop on an open-cockpit single-seater racing car that is taller than the head of the driver, so if the car rolls or inverts the driver’s head isn’t crushed against the track. Think (old) Formula 1.
As a (relatively) young solver who grew up listening to a fair bit of Bring Me The Horizon, whilst I was pleasantly surprised to see Oli Sykes crop up here, I can’t say I loved the surface of the clue – would’ve enjoyed it far more if either of the artists listed had any kind of song called Si-O-Si (or indeed if the two artists had ever collaborated on anything! I can’t find any evidence that this has ever been the case).
Simon S @14: my bad. Many thanks for the correction. And, of course, apologies to John for doubting him. Serves me right for trying to make a little knowledge go further than it should. Compounding my error by making an assumption. Definitely rather dim today.
First thanks go to Eileen. If I’ve ever seen that sketch before I certainly didn’t remember it (unlike the wonderful 4 candles, which comes around so often you can be word perfect by now). Oddly enough, I didn’t find this tough, though the theme totally passed me by. Must remember which day is Tuesday! Thanks to Hob and John
I didn’t actually find it too hard but failed on Ruhla. I see it now but thought it must have something to do with Ruhr and put unparsed Ruhra, which makes no sense! Missed the theme of course. Otherwise much enjoyed, so thanks Hob and John.
Wow, I consider myself fairly knowledgeable on classical music and opera and I had never heard of Friedrich Lux.
Tough, but I didn’t grind to a complete halt as sometimes happens. In the end I needed a word search for 6dn and I couldn’t parse 12ac. I googled RUHLA, just to check it does exist.
I was banjaxed because when I checked I found that RUHLE exists as somewhere in Germany so entered thaat before having 32.