So a little stiffer than usual – 7 minutes for me – but with some cracking clues. 14ac is both an slightly obscure piece of GK and a fiendishly well-disguised hidden word, which may raise cries of foul. But what a clue!
| Across |
| 1 |
Grilling, or being fried, possibly (10) |
|
DEBRIEFING – anagram (‘possibly’) of BEING FRIED |
| 8 |
Filth, look, fills plaza almost entirely (7) |
|
SQUALOR – LO (look) inside SQUAR[E] |
| 9 |
Some monosodium — a mightily savoury taste (5) |
|
UMAMI – hidden word |
| 10 |
Contact striking the head that hurts! (4) |
|
OUCH – TOUCH minus the T |
| 11 |
Exasperating book containing anger and spite primarily (8) |
|
TIRESOME – TOME (book) with IRE + S inside |
| 13 |
Hidden store of money picked up (5) |
|
CACHE – sounds like CASH |
| 14 |
Piece of felt alongside cards laid on a table (5) |
|
TALON – Hidden word. In various card games, the talon is the pile of cards not yet in play. It’s one of the million words I only know because I do crosswords. Pretty tough clue if you don’t know it. |
| 16 |
Quit a job, or agreed to a new contract? (8) |
|
RESIGNED – double definition, the second probably needs a hyphen |
| 17 |
In a higher position at work (4) |
|
ATOP – AT + OP |
| 20 |
Everybody has almost rejected God (5) |
|
ALLAH – ALL + HA[S] backwards |
| 21 |
Erewhon’s about non-existent place (7) |
|
NOWHERE – erewhon backwards. Also the title of a satirical novel by Samuel Butler |
| 22 |
Don’t say I’ve changed, it may be scary to behold (5,5) |
|
VIDEO NASTY – anagram (‘changed’) of DON’T SAY IVE. Rather dated term describing the moral panic that accompanied the arrival of the video recorder in the early 80s. See The Young Ones for more details. |
| Down |
| 1 |
Club record with vocoder in the middle (5) |
|
DISCO – DISC + [VOC]O[DER] |
| 2 |
Uncle and boys act out something at a kid’s party? (6,6) |
|
BOUNCY CASTLE – anagram (‘out’) of UNCLE BOYS ACT |
| 3 |
Passage lacking a key (4) |
|
ISLE – AISLE minus A |
| 4 |
In favour of proposed ban (6) |
|
FORBID – FOR (in favour) + BID (proposed) |
| 5 |
Well-organised European suppressing a US revolt (8) |
|
NAUSEATE – NEAT + E with A + US inserted. Quite a lot of moving parts for a quickie, and my LOI. |
| 6 |
Male writer such as JRR Tolkien or DBC Pierre? (3,2,7) |
|
MAN OF LETTERS – cryptic definition |
| 7 |
Continue working after wicked uprising (4,2) |
|
LIVE ON -ON (working) after EVIL backwards |
| 12 |
Principle of harmonious design for which iron is hung in pieces (4,4) |
|
FENG SHUI – FE (iron) + anagram (‘in pieces’) od IS HUNG |
| 13 |
Grass and concrete beneath church (6) |
|
CEREAL – REAL under CE |
| 15 |
Someone who is unkind — that is to say, below average (6) |
|
MEANIE – MEAN (average) + IE (that is to say) |
| 18 |
Devotion and compassion holding true in the end (5) |
|
PIETY – PITY with [TRU]E inserted |
| 19 |
Double whiskey in metal receptacle (4) |
|
TWIN – W inside TIN |
19:22 for me, so pretty slow. I was hampered by FORBID which required an alphabet trawl to locate (I did not spot the bid sense of proposed, and the word didn’t come to me).
I completed this outside of Crossword Club by accident, so I had a second go at it in Crossword Club just to see how fast I could type (followed by waiting for my real time to elapse before pressing submit). Even though I knew the answers already, I STILL only get it in 3 seconds faster than magoo. How does the madman do it? One can only marvel.
It was a fun puzzle until it wasn’t, not so much because of the frustrating hold-up at the end taking me to 22:06, but for the ugly experience of seeing the phrase VIDEO NASTY for the first, and hopefully last, time. Talk about word aversion! I’m well and truly nauseated.
Liked UMAMI, clever, and agree TALON was fiendish. I was so, so distracted by BEFRIENDInG at 1a. I don’t usually accuse a clue of being weak but I thought NOWHERE very weak, though if you don’t know about the book maybe not.
Thanks (I guess) to Jalna and Curarist.
14:30 NAUSEATE was a long holdup.
Managed to solve only half after 45min, so found this difficult.
Just avoided the SCC at 19:40. I wonder whether the mention of “a US revolt” on July 4th is more than a coincidence. That meaning of TALON was new to me: no doubt I will now forget it and be surprised again sometime in the future.
Thanks to Curarist and Jalna.
Tired after golf, but no real excuses. This was tough.
LOI TALON- I did not know the required meaning; after LIVE ON which was tricky.
20 minutes in all.
I solved the bottom half first.
David
6.57
TALON did vaguely ring a bell and as Vinyl says the answer was given us anyway. Phil gives us two excellent WODs but obvs I must plump for TWIN.
Thanks C and J
13:05. Took far too long doing this. I just wasn’t sure about TALON, and then the last couple took quite a while because I’d mistyped LIVE UP and was trying to find a word for TIRESOME ending in R. ah well I should always check….
Nowhere near! Would never have got NAUSEATE. Normally (??) in QC land suppress = delete rather than today’s “include”.
And yes failed on keys = isle and several others.
28 mins.
Appalling performance.
80 mins for week. Should have been far better. Best week I’ve had time wise but still nowhere near where I want to be.
NHO talon, but always happy to learn. In the US we have many a moral panic but NHO video nasty. Great puzzle!