Theme: Classic Music Contracts, A-List - Classic Rock hit songs that follow a pronoun and verb contraction & A & noun pattern in the titles.
17A: 1966 Monkey's hit: I'M A BELIEVER. Written by the Lovely Wife's favorite, Neil Diamond.
65A: 1968 Impressions hit: WE'RE A WINNER. Must not have impressed me. No recollection of it.
11D: 1971 Tom Jones hit: SHE'S A LADY. Or at least a woman. What's new, Pussycat?
36D: 1962 hit attributed to the Crystals but sung by the Blossoms: HE'S A REBEL. Here are the Crystals.
And, at no extra charge, 50A Original iPod, as it's now known: CLASSIC. Not really part of the theme, but I co-opted it, so there.
But wait, there's more -
31A Put on the HiFi: PLAY. Spin them platters!
Hi Gang, it's JazzBumpa, your HOT LIPS trombonIST. Nice retro theme for the CLASSIC rock lover in you. The puzzle is one letter J away from a pangram.
Across:
1A Distinguishing feature: CACHET. News to me. Merriam-Webster tells us:1 a : a seal used especially as a mark of official approval b : an indication of approval carrying great prestige. 2 a : a characteristic feature or quality conferring prestige. Well, OK, then.
7A "Is this _____ time to talk of Pensions and Grenadiers?": - Sterne: A FIT. Beats me. Can't track it down. Anybody have a clue?
11A Wailing instrument: Must be SAX. Harpoon won't fit.
14A Hit the big time: ARRIVE. You know you've arrived when you ___________. (Fill in the blank.)
15A Quote as a source: CITE. Like Sterne in 7A.
16A Dress bottom: HEM. Per Wikipedia, "To hem a piece of cloth (in sewing), a garment worker folds up a cut edge, folds it up again, and then sews it down. The process of hemming thus completely encloses the cut edge in cloth, so that it cannot ravel. A hem is also the edge of cloth treated in this manner." That's getting to the bottom of it!
19A Bard's "prior to": ERE. "Able was I ere I saw Elba" Your palindrome for the day.
20A Bright Star: NOVA. Also, an old Chevy. Also Spanish for "No go." Great name for a car.
21A Basic French verb: ETRE. Crossword staple, usually travels with RAISON D'.
22A "Beware the Jabberwock _________" MY SON. Excellent advice from my mom. "The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!" The Jabberwock, I mean. Not mom. She's a sweetie. Anyway, it was Lewis Carrol, not mom.
24A Warehouse stamp letters: REC'D. Received. Got it?
26A "Washboard" muscles. ABS. Abdominals. Six pack. Very gutsy. We watched "The biggest loser" tonight. Yikes!
27A Briney expanse: SEA. I couldn't force-fit PICKLE BARREL into 3 spaces.
28A "M*A*S*H" nickname: Major Margaret J. "HOT LIPS" Houlihan. Played by Loretta Swit.
34A Wildly eccentric, briefly: SCHIZO. Schizophrenic. Doesn't fit the clue very well. Nor does it refer to multiple personality disorders. My alter ego is a SCHIZO, but we get along OK.
37A Sniffling and sneezing cause: COLD. "Viral upper respiratory tract infection (VURI), acute viral nasopharyngitis, acute viral rhinopharyngitis, acute coryza." Not a low temperature, as we all seem to be experiencing. Anyway, I wanted DUST.
39 ________ Carte: A LA. A la Carte, meaning "according to the menu", or "on the wagon," or something like that. May or may not involve an extra charge. It's all very confusing.
40A Roll call response: PRESENT. My alter ego always responds, "ABSENT." He's incorrigible.
42A How some suits are made: TO ORDER. Mine are off the rack at Penny's.
44A Toys: "R" US. Couldn't fit "IN THE ATTIC", nor type a backward R. My alter ego says he knows how, but he went to bed.
45A Wild outbreak: RIOT. Very crosswordese. Wanted HORSES, or PANDEMIC.
47A Victimized, with "on": PREYED. Literally, caught and ate. Figuratively, used and abused. There are other options.
48A Wine bottle datum: YEAR. Some are very good. Also known as vintage.
52A Narrow inlet: RIA. Learned from doing crosswords. A wide inlet is RIA GRANDE.
54A Chick _____: light women's fiction: LIT. How politically incorrect is that. These books not read on "The Biggest Loser."
55A Nordic Runners: SKIS. Cute clue. The blades of skis are RUNNERS, I suppose.
58A Knight's Job: QUEST. A search or pursuit for something valuable. Like a shrubbery. And 2D Knight suit: ARMOR. Not Jammies.
60A Ice sheet: FLOE. A floating sheet of ice. Very COLD.
62A Burned, in a way: ON CD. You can do it yourself.
64A City area, briefely: URB. Short for an urban area, aka city.
68A Get older: AGE. Father time wins in the end.
69A Yemen city on its own Gulf. ADEN. Lots of trouble in Yemen, these days.
70A Early ascetic: ESSENE. I think I read somewhere that John the Baptist was an ESSENE, not a Southern Baptist.
71A State that's only 9 mi. wide at its narrowest point: DEL. Note Abbrv in cl.et. ans. MD gets pretty narrow, too.
72A Had second thoughts about: RUED. I thought this was more along the lines of deep regret.
73A Put away for later: STORED. These guys do it, and they're very protective.
Down:
1D Abel's slayer: CAIN. Original sibling rivalry. Why can't we all just get along?
3D Have a jones for: CRAVE. From the diction of addiction.
4D Japanese grills: HIBACHIS. A simple charcoal grill.
5D Noted victim of temptation: EVE. Clever clue. Mom of the original siblings, and early fig leaf HEMMER.
6D Prefix with vision: TELE. Television. Yeah. Whatever.
7D Biting: ACERBIC. As, wit. Same root as acid, I'll bet.
8D Fin: Am I done? No. It's a FIVE SPOT. A five dollar bill. Old slang. Anybody know where it came from?
9D Meteor ending: ITE. With or without, what's the difference?
10D Contract details: TERMS. Be sure to read the fine print.
12D Related to flying: AERO. That's plain.
13D Marvel Comics superheroes: X-MEN. Should be X-persons.
18D Emphatic type: Abbr.: ITAL. Italic. As you can see.
23D "Sho 'nuff": YEP. I agree. Though one could quibble about where to place the apo'strophe's.
25D Earth moving machine, and hopefully not the one driving it: DOZER. I love this clue. Short for bull dozer, hopefully not somebody taking a nap.
29D G and T part: TONIC. Gin and tonic. I needed a lot of perp help. My gin mixes with vermouth and drowns olives.
30D Spills, as from a bucket: SLOPS. Traditional method for hog feeding. Perhaps Windhover can elaborate.
32D Sheltered, in a way: ALEE. Away from the wind.
33D Place for a sale: YARD. Or garage. Or Target.
34D Nimble: SPRY. Agile, graceful. Somehow, "Jack be spry" just doesn't work.
35D Rockers Motley: CRUE. Ugly noise, IMHO.
38D Day of films: DORIS. Doris Day, clean cut sex goddess, before sex was invented. Clue got me - needed perp help.
41D Like 1-800 numbers. TOLL-FREE. That's why we like 1-800 numbers.
43D "I guess": RECKON SO. YEP.
46D Last bit: TAIL END. Sounds like a military expression, like tail gunner. Maybe Dennis can fill us in.
49 Grafton's "______ for Ricochet" R IS. Forward R this time. From Sue Grafton's alphabet mystery series. I got bored somewhere around F.
51D One often bordered an agora: STOA. Another crossword stalwart. I believe an agora was an outdoor market. A STOA is a collonade. In those days, "I'm goin' to the Stoa." was rather ambiguous.
53D Clashing, big time. AT WAR. That's about as big as it gets.
56D _________ Tube: INNER. An inflatable rubber bladder inside a tire.
57D Part of an act: SCENE. Acts of plays are divided into scenes. Or one can make a scene. Making many scenes is a bad act.
58D Campus area: QUAD. Short for quadrangle, a four-sided area surrounded by buildings.
59D Yearning: URGE. Should I give in . . .?
61D Ram's dams: EWES. I would feel sheepish if I didn't get this one.
63D Scott in an 1857 case: DRED. A much RUED decision.
66D Campus URL ending. EDU. ITE was already taken by the meteor.
67D Performer's suffix: IST. As in SAXophonist. Are there other examples?
That's all folks. Cheers!
Answer grid.
JzB
17A: 1966 Monkey's hit: I'M A BELIEVER. Written by the Lovely Wife's favorite, Neil Diamond.
65A: 1968 Impressions hit: WE'RE A WINNER. Must not have impressed me. No recollection of it.
11D: 1971 Tom Jones hit: SHE'S A LADY. Or at least a woman. What's new, Pussycat?
36D: 1962 hit attributed to the Crystals but sung by the Blossoms: HE'S A REBEL. Here are the Crystals.
And, at no extra charge, 50A Original iPod, as it's now known: CLASSIC. Not really part of the theme, but I co-opted it, so there.
But wait, there's more -
31A Put on the HiFi: PLAY. Spin them platters!
Hi Gang, it's JazzBumpa, your HOT LIPS trombonIST. Nice retro theme for the CLASSIC rock lover in you. The puzzle is one letter J away from a pangram.
Across:
1A Distinguishing feature: CACHET. News to me. Merriam-Webster tells us:1 a : a seal used especially as a mark of official approval b : an indication of approval carrying great prestige. 2 a : a characteristic feature or quality conferring prestige. Well, OK, then.
7A "Is this _____ time to talk of Pensions and Grenadiers?": - Sterne: A FIT. Beats me. Can't track it down. Anybody have a clue?
11A Wailing instrument: Must be SAX. Harpoon won't fit.
14A Hit the big time: ARRIVE. You know you've arrived when you ___________. (Fill in the blank.)
15A Quote as a source: CITE. Like Sterne in 7A.
16A Dress bottom: HEM. Per Wikipedia, "To hem a piece of cloth (in sewing), a garment worker folds up a cut edge, folds it up again, and then sews it down. The process of hemming thus completely encloses the cut edge in cloth, so that it cannot ravel. A hem is also the edge of cloth treated in this manner." That's getting to the bottom of it!
19A Bard's "prior to": ERE. "Able was I ere I saw Elba" Your palindrome for the day.
20A Bright Star: NOVA. Also, an old Chevy. Also Spanish for "No go." Great name for a car.
21A Basic French verb: ETRE. Crossword staple, usually travels with RAISON D'.
22A "Beware the Jabberwock _________" MY SON. Excellent advice from my mom. "The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!" The Jabberwock, I mean. Not mom. She's a sweetie. Anyway, it was Lewis Carrol, not mom.
24A Warehouse stamp letters: REC'D. Received. Got it?
26A "Washboard" muscles. ABS. Abdominals. Six pack. Very gutsy. We watched "The biggest loser" tonight. Yikes!
27A Briney expanse: SEA. I couldn't force-fit PICKLE BARREL into 3 spaces.
28A "M*A*S*H" nickname: Major Margaret J. "HOT LIPS" Houlihan. Played by Loretta Swit.
34A Wildly eccentric, briefly: SCHIZO. Schizophrenic. Doesn't fit the clue very well. Nor does it refer to multiple personality disorders. My alter ego is a SCHIZO, but we get along OK.
37A Sniffling and sneezing cause: COLD. "Viral upper respiratory tract infection (VURI), acute viral nasopharyngitis, acute viral rhinopharyngitis, acute coryza." Not a low temperature, as we all seem to be experiencing. Anyway, I wanted DUST.
39 ________ Carte: A LA. A la Carte, meaning "according to the menu", or "on the wagon," or something like that. May or may not involve an extra charge. It's all very confusing.
40A Roll call response: PRESENT. My alter ego always responds, "ABSENT." He's incorrigible.
42A How some suits are made: TO ORDER. Mine are off the rack at Penny's.
44A Toys: "R" US. Couldn't fit "IN THE ATTIC", nor type a backward R. My alter ego says he knows how, but he went to bed.
45A Wild outbreak: RIOT. Very crosswordese. Wanted HORSES, or PANDEMIC.
47A Victimized, with "on": PREYED. Literally, caught and ate. Figuratively, used and abused. There are other options.
48A Wine bottle datum: YEAR. Some are very good. Also known as vintage.
52A Narrow inlet: RIA. Learned from doing crosswords. A wide inlet is RIA GRANDE.
54A Chick _____: light women's fiction: LIT. How politically incorrect is that. These books not read on "The Biggest Loser."
55A Nordic Runners: SKIS. Cute clue. The blades of skis are RUNNERS, I suppose.
58A Knight's Job: QUEST. A search or pursuit for something valuable. Like a shrubbery. And 2D Knight suit: ARMOR. Not Jammies.
60A Ice sheet: FLOE. A floating sheet of ice. Very COLD.
62A Burned, in a way: ON CD. You can do it yourself.
64A City area, briefely: URB. Short for an urban area, aka city.
68A Get older: AGE. Father time wins in the end.
69A Yemen city on its own Gulf. ADEN. Lots of trouble in Yemen, these days.
70A Early ascetic: ESSENE. I think I read somewhere that John the Baptist was an ESSENE, not a Southern Baptist.
71A State that's only 9 mi. wide at its narrowest point: DEL. Note Abbrv in cl.et. ans. MD gets pretty narrow, too.
72A Had second thoughts about: RUED. I thought this was more along the lines of deep regret.
73A Put away for later: STORED. These guys do it, and they're very protective.
Down:
1D Abel's slayer: CAIN. Original sibling rivalry. Why can't we all just get along?
3D Have a jones for: CRAVE. From the diction of addiction.
4D Japanese grills: HIBACHIS. A simple charcoal grill.
5D Noted victim of temptation: EVE. Clever clue. Mom of the original siblings, and early fig leaf HEMMER.
6D Prefix with vision: TELE. Television. Yeah. Whatever.
7D Biting: ACERBIC. As, wit. Same root as acid, I'll bet.
8D Fin: Am I done? No. It's a FIVE SPOT. A five dollar bill. Old slang. Anybody know where it came from?
9D Meteor ending: ITE. With or without, what's the difference?
10D Contract details: TERMS. Be sure to read the fine print.
12D Related to flying: AERO. That's plain.
13D Marvel Comics superheroes: X-MEN. Should be X-persons.
18D Emphatic type: Abbr.: ITAL. Italic. As you can see.
23D "Sho 'nuff": YEP. I agree. Though one could quibble about where to place the apo'strophe's.
25D Earth moving machine, and hopefully not the one driving it: DOZER. I love this clue. Short for bull dozer, hopefully not somebody taking a nap.
29D G and T part: TONIC. Gin and tonic. I needed a lot of perp help. My gin mixes with vermouth and drowns olives.
30D Spills, as from a bucket: SLOPS. Traditional method for hog feeding. Perhaps Windhover can elaborate.
32D Sheltered, in a way: ALEE. Away from the wind.
33D Place for a sale: YARD. Or garage. Or Target.
34D Nimble: SPRY. Agile, graceful. Somehow, "Jack be spry" just doesn't work.
35D Rockers Motley: CRUE. Ugly noise, IMHO.
38D Day of films: DORIS. Doris Day, clean cut sex goddess, before sex was invented. Clue got me - needed perp help.
41D Like 1-800 numbers. TOLL-FREE. That's why we like 1-800 numbers.
43D "I guess": RECKON SO. YEP.
46D Last bit: TAIL END. Sounds like a military expression, like tail gunner. Maybe Dennis can fill us in.
49 Grafton's "______ for Ricochet" R IS. Forward R this time. From Sue Grafton's alphabet mystery series. I got bored somewhere around F.
51D One often bordered an agora: STOA. Another crossword stalwart. I believe an agora was an outdoor market. A STOA is a collonade. In those days, "I'm goin' to the Stoa." was rather ambiguous.
53D Clashing, big time. AT WAR. That's about as big as it gets.
56D _________ Tube: INNER. An inflatable rubber bladder inside a tire.
57D Part of an act: SCENE. Acts of plays are divided into scenes. Or one can make a scene. Making many scenes is a bad act.
58D Campus area: QUAD. Short for quadrangle, a four-sided area surrounded by buildings.
59D Yearning: URGE. Should I give in . . .?
61D Ram's dams: EWES. I would feel sheepish if I didn't get this one.
63D Scott in an 1857 case: DRED. A much RUED decision.
66D Campus URL ending. EDU. ITE was already taken by the meteor.
67D Performer's suffix: IST. As in SAXophonist. Are there other examples?
That's all folks. Cheers!
Answer grid.
JzB
