Listener 4094: Wet Wet Wet by Lato

[Zabadak]

A much bigger challenge, I thought this week, with some very clever plays involved in creating the group members. Lots of lovely pennies dropping all the way through. I'd be interested to see how soon the theme dawned on other solvers, and whether that helped in the more conventional solving process. Congratulations to Lato on a fine piece of work. Happy solving, everyone!

[IntoTheBlue]

A harder puzzle than of late but an enjoyable one. I didn't twig the theme for certain until about 3/4 of the way through the grid with the misprints giving me the location and this allied with the title and the unclued entry at 15d confirmed my thinking.
(Took me a while to finish though as I was looking for a larger group.)

20a and 18d were my last two clues and held me up until I realised what the plural of the word 20a was.

Thanks very much Lato.

IntoTheBlue

[x_word_fan]

Just finished - a long slow battle yesterday (just like England) until I somewhat fortunately saw what the misprints could be made into ( lucky because I had one of them which was the correct letter but in the wrong clue) - and luckily (again) for me I have been to the area of the location many times so saw the connection with the normal clue at once. Still can't see the word play for 34a.

Don

[IntoTheBlue]

x_word_fan for 34a think of most of a 3 letter word for settled to add to a boy's name.

IntoTheBlue

[x_word_fan]

Thanks "into the blue" - not the boy's usual spelling I think.

[JackDeCrow]

Also saved by the misprints - in my case from excessive research into the works of Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark !!!

[tristram37]

Well for the second week running I find myself stumped. I must be going senile. I've solved all the clues except 18d, found 5 of the 6 extra words and found all the misprints which spell just one (totally unhelpful) word, and failed to see any of the connections so obvious to everyone else. There are so many possibilities for the shorter unclued answers, and the longer ones only seem to produce words or phrases which have no connection with each other or anything else. Any hints?

[daagg]

If your word really rings no bells when associated with any of the clued answers, then I suspect you have a mis-misprint (as I did). I wrote out the full and partial unclued answers in length order, then stared at them looking for two possible synonyms. My first guess produced an anagram which solved everything else.

[teuchter2]

I finally got there this morning, having been nearly there yesterday. 18d was my last clue to be solved as well. I got into it through the misprints, but there are certainly plenty of red herrings to lead the unwary astray. My stumbling-block was to get one of the unclued entries of the six muddled up with one of the two, so for a while I had the wrong number of letters to rearrange, even though I know what I was looking for and should have got there much sooner. Perhaps I was distracted by the footie. The octopus is always right!

[tristram37]

Thank you daagg. Your innocent little comment just lateralised my thinking enough to enable me to twig what was going on without giving the slighest hint of a spoiler. All is now safely gathered in.

[JackDeCrow]

glad to see I wasn't the only one to struggle with 18d - didn't really see the need for the word "forgotten"

[JackDeCrow]

Ah - now I do! The explanation not quite in the place I was expecting it in Chambers!

[contendo]

A long slog but I got there in the end. Not a v satisfactory crossword: too many blind alleys. Didn't understand the definition in 31A or the wordplay in 8A. Why "On the contrary" in 15A & I still don't understand "forgotten" in 18D.

[dr b]

contendo, without giving away too much info, in 8a "to say" signals a sound-alike, 31a, "in places" signals a regional meaning, 18a, "forgotten" means an obsolete usage, 15a, "A made from B - on the contrary" means "B made from A".

[contendo]

Thanks, dr b. It seems I got there without fully understanding some of the clues, which is quite satisfying, or at least better than understanding the clues and not getting there.

[tilbee]

Away for the weekend, but really enjoyed this one last night, and spent time after work today deriving the final members of the group and working back to the definitions and final grid entries. Like many initially sidetracked by the title and reference to the lead singer - but misprints helped greatly - only needed 3 to guess the anagram and therefore associated normal entry - even though I also luckily had a correct letter based on the wrong clue.

[shelouse]

I also enjoyed this:thanks, Lato. My breakthrough came with the 7 letter anagram about 2/3 of the way through. Then it all fell into place fairly swiftly, although I had to unscramble a mistake made by using one of the unclued entries as part of a word instead of being part of the two word anagram of the group's identity I spent a long time looking for a salad, as well ..................

[silversolver]

Agree that this one really tested the grey cells. 18 down was also the last clue for me. I initially got the theme from the misprints, confirmed shortly thereafter by the three unclued 2-word synonyms. The two highlighted synonymous unclued entries also revealed themselves without too much difficulty. However, the final stage trying to find the members of the group from the six extra words was far from straightforward, even though I knew what I was looking for. An excellent and challenging puzzle - thanks, Lato.

[bobbycollins]

I found this a difficult, but extremely taut, puzzle.

I had a late start due to having been away from home at the weekend. My wife and I actually walked past the location on Saturday morning and we were very WET WET WET. When the penny dropped I legged it into the living room to share the coincidence with Mrs bobbycollins. She was suitably underwhelmed, not having fully recovered from Saturday's drenching. Glad to hear that it was sunny darn sarf!!!

[starwalker]

bobbycollins, my commiserations to yourself and your good lady. Both cJ and I thought that the title was quite apt and fun - but then, we weren't out in it !