Times 27111 – not marketed correctly?

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
I had a lot of fun with this one, for some reason starting with 20a on a quick glance through, finishing the SE corner and working my way up and across to end with the guessed-from-wordplay 2d. Around 25 minutes all told. When I had two X’s and two Z’s in early, I was thinking at least one if not a double pangram, but it was not so. I am now better informed about a violent kind of dancing and an amateur expert on ice skating manoeuvres. 1d gets my CoD award for its audacity.

Across
1 Exaggerated passion about which to sing sometimes? (8)
CAMPFIRE – CAMP = exaggerated, FIRE = passion. Ging Gang Gooly Gooly, I remember.
5 Ancient Roman wheel mark crossed by modern vehicle (6)
BRUTUS – RUT is crossed by a BUS.
8 Images that are missing beginning to cause doubts (3)
IFS – GIFS (images in Graphic Interchange Format) lose their initial G.
9 Perform a track using axe (2,4,4)
DO AWAY WITH – DO = perform, A WAY = a track, WITH = using.
10 East Windows — since replaced — permitted, revealing everything (8)
EXPLICIT – E = east, XP = version of Windows since replaced, LICIT = permitted.
11 Cardinal featuring in sex-change, excommunicated (6)
NINETY – Hidden inside SE(X C)HANGE are the Roman numerals for ninety, XC. At first I stuffed in NUNCIO thinking the Papal chap would be a cardinal, but had to re-visit when faced with 7d.
12 Jump is something that takes pluck, with unknown ending (4)
LUTZ – On the rare occasions I’ve watched ice skating on TV for more than a few seconds before switching channels, I’ve heard the commentator refer to a ‘triple Lutz’  which I see is a jump named after an intrepid Austrian chap who did it first in 1913, one Alois Lutz. To get the answer I think you replace the E of LUTE (something that takes pluck) with the unknown Z. For ages I was looking for LUT being a real Scrabble word in English not just an abbreviation in computing; as you may know, a lookup table or LUT is an array that replaces runtime computation with a simpler array indexing operation.
14 Religious leaders call for peace: give affirmative answer back (10)
AYATOLLAHS – Reverse all of: SH (call for peace), ALLOT (give), AY (affirmative), A (answer).
17 Someone evidently bad-mouthing weakness is wrong (10)
DISSERVICE – a DISSER could be a bad-mouther, and VICE = weakness.
20 Touring Australia, leave for island (4)
GOZO – GO around OZ and end up in Gozo, smaller island in Malta.
23 Poles belonging to the workforce (6)
STAFFS – STAFF’S would be belonging to the workforce.
24 Exemplary message: secure? (8)
TEXTBOOK – TEXT = message, BOOK = secure, reserve; TEXTBOOK as in example.
25 Match-winner, or miss? There’s nothing in it (6,4)
GOLDEN GOAL – GOLDEN = or, GAL = miss, insert an O.
26 There’s a surprise, seeing hotel amidst castles (3)
OHO – H for Hotel in between the two 0’s used as notation for ‘castles’ as a move in chess.
27 Drawing stick from a crony for corruption (6)
CRAYON – (A CRONY)*.
28 A consequence of murders: riot (8)
OFFSHOOT – OFFS = murders, HOOT = riot, as in he’s a hoot, a riot, very funny.

Down
1 Sharply-defined foreign character, marketed incorrectly? (9)
CHISELLED – CHI Greek letter, SELLED meaning marketed in very bad English.
2 In place of wild dancing, doctors knock around quietly (4,3)
MOSH PIT – I guessed this from the checkers and wordplay, as my LOI. MOS = doctors, HIT = knock, around P = quietly. Apparently there is a form of dancing called MOSHING where one aggressively bumps into other people, carried out in a pit, to very loud punk type ‘music’. Verlaine may be a fan, perhaps, when he’s not in Seattle.
3 Filming technique: fancy German one (4-2)
FADE-IN – FAD = fancy, EIN = German for one.
4 Big Brother and co? Resistance vital, yet hopeless (7,2)
REALITY TV – (R VITAL YET)*.
5 Bounty I resolved to accept (3,4)
BUY INTO – (BOUNTY I)*
6 Our standard of higher education about to drop (5,4)
UNION FLAG – UNI = higher education, ON = about, FLAG = to drop.
7 Release body of Manhattan Yank (7)
UNHITCH – I’m a bit lukewarm on this. the UN is a Body with its HQ in Manhattan, true. And a meaning of YANK can be the same as HITCH, as in ‘to hitch up one’s trousers’. I suppose it works. Not crazy about it though.
13 Tutorial ultimately left Suzy bursting with enthusiasm (9)
ZESTFULLY – (L LEFT SUZY)*, the L from end of TUTORIAL.
15 Scolded, as things removed from to-do list? (6,3)
TICKED OFF – Double definition.
16 What wineshops can do for a town (9)
STOCKPORT – wine shops can STOCK PORT.
18 Note to obtain national insurance, looking up number (7)
INTEGER – All reversed; RE = note, GET = obtain, NI = national insurance.
19 Girl from Central Europe, Polish (7)
ROSHEEN – (EU) RO (PE), SHEEN = polish. I’ve never seen it spelt this way only the Irish way, ROISIN with an accent on the second I. I suppose it’s an Anglicisation like SHAUN for SEAN.
21 Drink up on one’s own, welcoming men round (7)
OLOROSO – SOLO welcomes OR = men then O = round; all ‘up’.
22 English going out of fashion for American writer of history (6)
STYLUS – STYLE loses its E, the US for American. Old kind of writer, I was thinking of Roman historians for a while.

64 comments on “Times 27111 – not marketed correctly?”

  1. DNF. Gave up with 5 to go; NINETY, TEXTBOOK, UNHITCH, OLOROSO, STYLUS and 1 wrong MeSH PIT. Liked CHISELLED and EXPLICIT.
  2. That was certainly unusual. It took a good deal longer than normal, and I had to just biff NINETY, AYATOLLAHS, and I guess LUTZ too. Sort of a semi-biff on UNHITCH. The CHISELLED device could lead us all to a lot of murkily created wordplay, but once I saw that one, it was clearly the answer. A bit of a mind stretching exercise altogether, but rewarding in the end. The girl’s name was new to me too. Regards.
  3. Around NINETY minutes to complete. Apart from a brief burst ten minutes in, this was a slow plod through the setter’s landscape, not helped by entering ZEALOUSLY at 13d.

    (Un)luckily, I have been moshed many times – one of those unlucky observers trying to enjoy the gig but on the edge of the twits beyond caring whether they elbow you in the face. I almost prefer being showered with beer.

  4. Got through it in two goes – around 30 mins all in. Quite a handful. Great blog, thanks pip.
  5. On Monday we had Pontefract, where I used to live – today Stockport where I was born. Maybe on Friday I will learn in which town I am to end my days?
        1. Whichever town appears in Friday’s crossword – I will never travel there. I hope it’s not London (difficult to avoid).
  6. I needed an hour for all but 1ac and 3dn which typically both fell within 5 mins on returning to the puzzle after work. Ninety was of course biffed from cardinal and checkers with no clue about the parsing until coming here. I thought this crossword was terrific, loads of invention, just lots and lots of fun to solve. I am bursting with as much enthusiasm for it as 13dn’s Suzy at the end of her tutorial. I wonder if one might find the ayatollah of rock and rolla in the mosh pit. Gozo FOI. Campfire LOI. COD 4dn.
  7. This was a value-for-money puzzle, keeping me thinking (if that’s not too strong a word) for a little less than fifty minutes.

    UNHITCH went in only vaguely parsed, and OHO on a wing and a prayer. If “O” is the chess notation for “castles”, then wouldn’t two of them be “castleses”? AYATOLLAHS was left unassembled – I could see that all the pieces were there, but wasn’t prepared to go through the effort of assembling them.

    NTLOI TEXTBOOK, LOI OLOROSO, after TEXTBOOK made Orinoco mechanically unfeasible. I had grave misgivings over ROSHEEN, which I assumed was one of those madey-uppey names like Jerrika or Charenne, as opposed to naturally-occurring ones like Jane or Emily. To learn from our esteemed blogger that it can also be spelled Roisin just makes it all the more bewildering.

    Edited at 2018-08-08 08:02 pm (UTC)

  8. Could someone please advise me on how to not be “Anonymous” if I wish to make a comment in the blog? I have tried to sign up without success.
    I complete The Times cryptics every day (not at the record speeds of the bloggers!) and often refer to the journal afterwards to see how others have found them (for example, I found all last week’s crosswords more challenging than usual – wanted to know if it was just me or the heat!).
    Help will be appreciated. Just reply to ‘Anon’ on the blog!
    Incidentally, I have Tim Moorey coming to Kent next March 18th (evening) to do a talk about doing cryptic crosswords, if anyone would like to meet him. Can this be announced in the journal?
    1. If you want help with signing up, anon, you will have to supply details of the problems you are having. I’m not aware of any ongoing difficulties but others may know more. Usually it’s just a matter of coming up with a username that has not already been taken, and if that’s what’s happening to you, just adding two or three random numbers to it should help.

      In the meantime please put a name, made-up or otherwise, at the end of your contributions and that will distinguish you from the other anons.

      With regard to your crossword event I don’t think there’d be any objection to your posting about it here and giving details. Adding a message to a blog early in the morning should ensure maximum readership.

      Edited at 2018-08-08 08:40 pm (UTC)

  9. Thank you, jackkt. I am no longer “Anonymous” having added the odd asterisk and underscore to my password and changed my username. I will now be known as “Chloe54x”.
    I have sometimes added comments with a signature at the end, but it has been annoying not being able to sign in!
  10. If you haven’t heard of it, you are not going to work it out from the cryptic, so this is a case of ‘obscurity clued by obscurity’ which is bad form.

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