What fun! A fine set of clues with some very slippery definitions and a broad range of languages, not just the normal French and occasional German. I can’t say I whizzed through: the whole thing took 20.18, with the Mick Jagger clue providing most of the delaying tactics, possibly only for me.
To keep us entertained/annoyed there are two Bible stories referenced, though you can get away without remembering your hours in Sunday School. There is one (French) word which only rang very faint bells, perhaps as one of those Arthurian mystical places, though it evidently isn’t.
Much enjoyed, which I hope is evident in my expositions below.
Definitions underlined in italics, letters to be lost enclosed in [], explanations otherwise given in eclectic form.
| Across | |
| 1 | Cabinet door to be fixed: source latest info here (6,5) |
| NOTICE BOARD – An anagram (to be fixed) of CABINET DOOR | |
| 7 | Godsend in a climate crisis? Days no longer starting gloomy (3) |
| ARK – References the Noah story in a somewhat oblique way, open to discussion in so many ways, preferably not here. D for days no longer starts DARK. | |
| 9 | Address: perhaps Mick Jagger dropped round (9) |
| HAILSTONE – Well, it’s dropped from the sky and it’s round. To address is to HAIL, and Mick Jagger is a (Rolling) STONE. | |
| 10 | Stunning woman left making confused sound (5) |
| BABEL – Referencing the skyscraper myth in Genesis leading to the confusion (maybe from Hebrew בבל, BBL) of language. Stunning woman is (according to the setter, don’t blame me!) a BABE. Add L[eft] | |
| 11 | Salt brill — tons consumed (7) |
| ACETATE – An ester of acetic acid, which must also be a salt. Brill(iant) transforms to ACE in slang which is probably years out of date. Add T[ons] and ATE for consumed. | |
| 12 | Artemis dances for eminent musicians (7) |
| MAESTRI – An anagram (dances) of ARTEMIS | |
| 13 | Asian last character to remain in United Kingdom (5) |
| UZBEK – Last character is, of course, Z, remain becomes BE, both contained in the UK. In 2021, there were around 4,000 such. | |
| 15 | Influential jazzman has power blowing hard (9) |
| ARMSTRONG – Louis, presumably, though Neil played baritone horn at University. I think power gives ARM, as in military power, and blowing hard must then give STRONG, as referenced in the Beaufort scale. | |
| 17 | Popular movement to ostracise fwightful person? (9) |
| BANDWAGON – Ho ho! Jonathan Woss is drafted in to give his pronunciation of D(W/R)AGON as a f(w/r)ightful person. Precede with BAN for ostracise. | |
| 19 | The writer is taken aback about periodically harsh language (5) |
| MASAI – Spoken in the highlands of Kenya and Tanzania. “The writer is” translates to I AM, which is reversed (taken aback) surrounding the even letters of hArSh. | |
| 20 | Cherished houses close to Wimbledon decorated (7) |
| ADORNED – ADORED from cherished takes in the last (close to) letter of WimbledoN | |
| 22 | Drunk revises inebriation (7) |
| IVRESSE – An anagram (drunk) of REVISES. You might guess this is French. Well done! I’ve tried in vain to source its use in English: I suspect it’s in some some sort of florid poetry. Please feel free to advise! | |
| 24 | This writer is past final stage in development (5) |
| IMAGO – Such as when a moth is actually a moth. The writer is: I’M (see above) and past: AGO. | |
| 25 | Italian score’s recently added for air (9) |
| VENTILATE – Air as a verb. VENTI is Italian for 20 (a score) and LATE stands in for recently added. | |
| 27 | Born in Cambridge alongside Backs (3) |
| NEE – The back letters of iN CambridgE alongsidE. For those unfamiliar with Cambridge, the Backs is/are the green areas behind some of the colleges and alongside the Cam affording rather splendid views. | |
| 28 | Destroy pests initially missed in old art gallery (11) |
| EXTERMINATE – Pests are VERMIN, in this case without their initial V, contained in EX for old and TATE the representative gallery. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Drama from Norwegian of humble beginnings (3) |
| NOH – Japanese traditional theatre. The first letters of Norwegian Of Humble. | |
| 2 | Clan’s note welcoming supportive member (5) |
| TRIBE – The note is TE (I drink with jam and bread) enclosing RIB, a supporting architectural structure. | |
| 3 | Horseman mounted donkey in turn to one side (7) |
| COSSACK – From Russian. A reversed (mounted) donkey or ASS is inside COCK for turn to one side, as one might cock one’s head. | |
| 4 | Kylie having mare: bongo out of sync! (9) |
| BOOMERANG – Kylie is First Nation Australian for our entry, an anagram (out of sync) of MARE BONGO. Nice surface referencing Charlene of Neighbours, later megastar chanteuse. | |
| 5 | Running across a motorway south of Lincoln? (5) |
| ABEAM – It’s a down clue, so A M[otorway] is south of ABE Lincoln. | |
| 6 | Publisher of numerous titles retired, saddled with arrears (7) |
| DEBRETT – Debrett’s Peerage and Baronetage lists every titled person in Britain. An abbreviated RET[ired] is surrounded by (saddled with) DEBT for arrears. The original John Debrett went bankrupt twice in his publishing career. | |
| 7 | Very unusual hole in one creature shot in Coleridge (9) |
| ALBATROSS – DD, a 3 under par hole in one in golf, and the crossbow victim of the Ancient Mariner immortalised in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Rime (sic). | |
| 8 | Finding idle amusement when slaughter occurs? (7,4) |
| KILLING TIME – An immediate second DD, the second whimsical. | |
| 11 | Outline a stupid speech where nothing’s deleted (11) |
| ADUMBRATION – I thought more to do with shadowing, but Chambers gives “a faint outline”. It’s a stupid speech, A DUMB ORATION with (one of) its 0s deleted. | |
| 14 | Starts to venture overseas in spare time: travel well (3,6) |
| BON VOYAGE – More French(!) but a well enough known expression. The first letters of V[enture] O[verseas] within BONY, spare, and AGE, time. | |
| 16 | When drunk sing Moon River for Catholic dignitary (9) |
| MONSIGNOR – More Italian! An anagram (drunk, again!) of SING MOON R[iver]. | |
| 18 | Enchanting twins come to disavow origins? (7) |
| WINSOME – All you do with this one is knock the first letters off [t]WINS and [c]OME. | |
| 19 | Drink Bond likes can ruin one’s clothing (7) |
| MARTINI – Can is TIN, clothed by MAR for ruin and I for one. I like Kingsman Eggsy’s version: “With gin of course. Stirred for 10 seconds while glancing at an unopened bottle of vermouth.” | |
| 21 | Cover music composed for two that takes in verse (5) |
| DUVET – French again (it’s not pronounced dove et). Music for two is DUET, insert V[erse] | |
| 23 | “Indian singer” is false answer (5) |
| SHAMA – You might have to guess this Hindi song thrush, but it’s just SHAM, false plus A[nswer]. | |
| 26 | First person given audition gets attention (3) |
| EYE – At the last our aural charade: eye sounds like I, first person. | |
Good puzzle but tough – took me 50 minutes with Masai LOI (I was sure it was going to be Maori until I finally saw Albatross).
As others above, COD to Bandwagon.
22.35. I had no idea about the parsing of ‘ivresse’ or ‘shama’, but couldn’t be much else.
Flew through this over a large single malt. My last for the evening as I dont to get too ivresse. Really enjoyed it (crossword too)
Cracking puzzle. Failed on the SHAMA/IVRESSE crossers. 20 mins for the rest, much enjoyed. DNK that origin of Kylie! Many thanks Z.
DNF
I think these crosswords are getting easier. Certainly the snitch suggests the past 2 weeks have been generous. As an interloper from the QC pages it’s always pleasing to get near finishing the main puzzle. Defeated today by IVRESSE and SHAMA.
Nearly put in HEADSTONE, but then remembered the story told by Keith Richard about Charlie Watts clocking Jagger when he referred to them as “my band”. Or did he say “my drummer”? Anyway, we can’t call him Head Stone! 18′ 32″ all up. And now I know what ADUMBRATION means!
Apologies to Zabadak but an acetate is a salt of acetic acid, formed by reacting with a base such as sodium hydroxide.
An ester would be formed when acetic acid reacts with an alcohol such as ethanol.
Never seen IVRESSE used in English, but it’s an easy one for francophones. France used to do magnificent public poster campaigns against alcoholism with melodramatic wordings such as: “Dans the foyer ou l’alcool est ROI, l’homme est une BRUTE, la femme une MARTYRE et les enfants des VICTIMES”. Those were the days.
https://www.abebooks.fr/magazines-periodiques/ALCOOL-SANTE-4%C3%A8me-TRIMESTRE-1952-FOYER/14792541051/bd#&gid=1&pid=1
Quite lucky that I know French which helped with IVRESSE. I also know that Kylie as a name comes from the word “karli” meaning boomerang in the Aboriginal language originally spoken in what is now Perth. But I had never heard of Debrett’s or a SHAMA as a bird, so every day is a school day I guess.
Agree with JC above re BABE as a “stunning , and also many solvers in the unfair use of IVRESSE ( which I had to look up to see if it existed). But overall a fun crossword, where my main holdup was not being able to spell MONSIGNOR ( was trying in vain to fit MONSEIGN?? In there somewhere). Some clever definitions (“dropped round” and “publisher of numerous titles”). Good Thursday workout.