Independent 10,966 by Dalibor

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The puzzle is available here.

 

Hi everyone.  Dalilbor brings us a very enjoyable puzzle with a musical flavour, which is all to be expected from this setter.  I found it reasonably tricky, but less so than previous Dalibor crosswords.  I was held up at the end by FRANÇOIS HOLLANDE (17/16d) and the intersecting SEYMOUR at 20a; I wanted all the checkers for the latter, but it took me an absolute age to unscramble the anagram.

My picks today are DRY-CLEANERS and LITURGY (29a and 19d respectively), but I could easily add more, especially form the music playlist.  Thanks Dalibor!

 

Definitions are underlined in the clues below.  In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics, explicit [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER.  For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.

 

Across

1a    Cleopatra foolishly drinking in the morning – this to feel better? (11)
PARACETAMOL
An anagram of (… foolishly) CLEOPATRA containing (drinking) AM (in the morning)

7a    Prince of Wales perhaps wasted last four of teenage years (3)
PUB
The first three letters only (wasted last four) of PUBerty (teenage years)

9a    Previous head of religious community (5)
PRIOR
Two definitions

10a   After separation, female accepted street food (9)
BREAKFAST
After BREAK (separation), F (female) + A (accepted) + ST (street)

11a   Rod made a phone call to ELO, for backing on record (5,4)
RANGE POLE
RANG (made a call to) + ELO reversed (for backing) next to (on) EP (record)

12a   Pretty entertaining start to high jump (5)
CHUTE
CUTE (pretty) around (entertaining) the first letter of (start to) High

13a   Duet with nun terribly out of key (7)
UNTUNED
DUET with NUN anagrammed (terribly)

15a   Wrote a report that’s incomplete in a rush (4)
TEAR
WroTE A Report, partially (that’s incomplete)

18a   Turn left twice on motorway to reach part of Scotland (4)
MULL
U (turn) + L L (left twice) by (on) M (motorway)

20a   Queen‘s Speech used by some to broaden one’s horizon (7)
SEYMOUR
A homophone, allowing for different accents, (speech used by some) of SEE MORE (broaden one’s horizon)

23a   Animal‘s acceleration between satisfactory and very good (5)
OKAPI
A (acceleration) between OK (satisfactory) and PI (very good)

24a   Strong material Art composed with his partner’s all the rage (9)
TARPAULIN
ART anagrammed (composed) + PAUL (his partner, Paul Simon) + IN (all the rage)

26a   Little known candidate‘s a nightmare? (4,5)
DARK HORSE
DARK (night) + HORSE (mare), with the ? indicating some funny business

27a   Point out it’s a kind of kidney bean (5)
PINTO
POINT anagrammed (out)

28a   These days North Korea’s ready for revolution (3)
NOW
WON (North Korea’s ready, as in ready money) reversed (for revolution)

29a   Exotic dancer surely not suitable for all Johnsons? (3-8)
DRY-CLEANERS
An anagram of (exotic) DANCER S[u]RELY without U (not suitable for all)

 

Down

1d    Glimpse into a couple of pages reveals item that’s disposable (5,3)
PAPER CUP
APERÇU (glimpse) goes into P P (a couple of pages)

2d    Power couple, losing money, flare up again (8)
REIGNITE
REIGN (power) + ITE[m] (couple) without (losing) M (money)

3d    Witchy Woman roughly cut on Eagles’ debut (5)
CIRCE
CIRCa (roughly) without the last letter (cut) + Eagles’ first letter (debut)

4d    “One Liberal removed from manipulated ballot papers” (The Sun?) (7)
TABLOID
One L (liberal) is removed from an anagram of (manipulated) BAL[l]OT + ID (papers)

5d    Sheep tucking into pig’s food could be a life-saver (3,4)
MAE WEST
EWE (sheep) inside (tucking into) MAST (pig’s food)

6d    Utterly enjoy Mad (4,5)
LIKE CRAZY
LIKE (enjoy) + CRAZY (mad)

7d & 8.    Blue flag protects vessel with fish, capsized in sticky substance (6,6)
PEANUT BUTTER
PETER (blue flag) surrounds (protects) the reversal of (… capsized) TUB (vessel) with TUNA (fish)

8d    See 7d

14d   No problem with Rushdie being supported (9)
NOURISHED
NO + an anagram of (problem with) RUSHDIE

16d   See 17

17d & 16.   Former politician‘s aide on call for NHS treatment (8,8)
FRANCOIS HOLLANDE
An anagram (treatment) of AIDE ON CALL FOR NHS

19d   Unspecified bug blocked by IT service (7)
LITURGY
LURGY (unspecified bug) containing (blocked by) IT

20d   To start with, Sheffield United take on Spanish side – hard to believe (7)
SURREAL
The first letters of (to start with) Sheffield United + R (recipe, take) + REAL (Spanish side, Real Madrid)

21d   Mixture of old and new working capital (6)
LONDON
An anagram (mixture) of OLD + N (new) + ON (working)

22d   Ordinary women in support of Andrew? That’s essential! (6)
MARROW
O (ordinary) and W (woman) after (in support of, in a down entry) MARR (Andrew)

25d   Bright star in clinical pharmacy (5)
ALPHA
The first or brightest star in a constellation is hidden in clinicAL PHArmacy

 

16 comments on “Independent 10,966 by Dalibor”

  1. A beautiful puzzle with the same stumbling blocks as you, Kitty (and many more I would guess). In my case, I ended up cheating on SEYMOUR which then gave me enough letters to unscramble the anagram for 17/16.

    Loved the fact that “paracetamol” contains an anagram of “Cleopatra” and the way this was woven into the surface of 1a. 20d was another lovely surface, not that the others were shabby – quite the reverse.

    Wasn’t sure about “chute” for “jump”. Is it short for a parachute jump?

  3. Another fine puzzle from Dalibor. The Blades v Los Galacticos eh? Hmmm.
    I struggled a bit with the Francois Hollande anagram which required a piece of paper…not often that happens.
    Thanks to D & Kitty.

  4. Lots of music for those of us who’ve also commented on last week’s Guardian prize. Splendid start to the weekend. Sadly, I confess to failure on FRANCOIS HOLLANDE though I was pleased to get SEYMOUR.

    With regard to chute, two possible justifications. A chute is a slide into a pool so could possibly be termed a jump. Far more compelling is the chute as a horse jump – or, rather, a series of jumps. Apparently part of free jumping which is defined in Wikipedia as the practice of jumping a horse without a rider.

    Thanks Dalibor and kitty.

  5. I think this is the first Dalibor puzzle I have attempted, and I thought it was very enjoyable on the whole. I wasn’t keen on CHUTE at first but it does appear in Collins as short for “parachute” both as a noun and a verb. I also think that JOHNSONS was extraordinarily obscure, and that the description of FRANCOIS HOLLANDE as simply a “former politician” was too vague.

    SEYMOUR was my favourite.

    Thanks to Dalibor and to Kitty.

  8. Another newbie to Dalibor’s puzzles and I quite enjoyed most of this one although I had reservations about CHUTE and can’t abide the taste of PEANUT BUTTER!
    Top three for me were SEYMOUR, OKAPI & DARK HORSE.

    Thanks to Dalibor and to our lovely kitten for the review.

    bobf @ 7 – Latin terminology in 20d, often seen on medical prescriptions.

  10. Bobf @7: recipe comes from the Latin meaning ‘take’ and is found in the medical abbreviation/symbol Rx or simply ‘r’ and is one of those setters’ tricks for indicating a single letter.

    No takers, so far, for my CHUTE?

  11. Completed and enjoyed this but agree with Rabbit Dave @5 that M. Hollande required more definition.
    Solving names is hard enough without them being French!
    Given that chute is definitely short for the noun parachute I just assumed it was OK for the verb also.
    Thanks to S&B

  12. This was my favourite puzzle of the week, and I managed to get through most of with no help. I did then struggle with the last few, including FRANÇOIS HOLLANDE. For some reason it didn’t click that treatment was an anagrind in this one.

    PARACETEMOL, NOURISHED and DRY CLEANERS all favourites.

  13. I am another who stumbled on M. Hollande, but I enjoyed the apercu in PAPER CUP and Cleo’s morning pick-me-up.

  14. DRY-CLEANERS is brilliant, the possibly tricky def well worth it. I’ve only been to a Johnsons once; from that admittedly limited experience, their business model appears to be to set high prices and advise new customers that they could certainly do better elsewhere.
    I had difficult with both PEANUT BUTTER and M Hollande; the adjacency of the parts meant that there was a shortage of crossing letters, for the crossing solutions and as a result of being unable to solve them (PUB particularly), for the long ones.
    I also liked the apercu in PAPER CUP and PARACETAMOL, and think there’s something a bit funny about ‘speech used by some’ as an indicator – doesn’t it need an ‘in’ before ‘speech’ or something to that effect? Also, how do people pronounce Seymour if not see more?
    Thanks Dalibor, Kitty

  15. Many thanks to those who took the time to solve and/or to comment on the crossword.
    And, of course, especially to Kitty for a blog that explains it all perfectly well!
    The grid fill of this puzzle (plus a significant number of clues) originates from 2015/2016 – at a time when François Hollande was still leading the French (which probably explains his appearance).
    Maybe five years ago 17dn/16 wouldn’t have been such a stumbling block.
    As to CHUTE (12ac), the intention was ‘chute’ being used as an informal word for ‘parachute’.
    ‘Jump from an aeroplane and descend with a parachute’, as I read somewhere.
    I was never totally happy with it but kept it because of ‘high / jump’, and neither both test solvers nor Eimi made objections.
    But, yes, in hindsight it’s really borderline stuff.

  16. I did this on my first trip to the opera in nearly two years and with no aids, 16/17, and therefore 20ac, defeated me.

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