Suspicious, informally / SUN 4-28-24 / Rapper who shares part of his name with the world's tallest building / Trees that can grow multiple acres wide / Footwear retailer founded in Montreal / Gazing angrily / Some Olds of old / Percussive shaker / Slopes attire resembling overalls / Marsalis family patriarch

Constructor: Mike Ellison

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "The Sounds of Music" — notes in the scale (the octave from DO to DO) appear in gray squares as the tail ends of various musical (-ish) Across answers, turning downward; this downward turn is explained by two revealers: SCALE DOWN (42D: Cut back ... or an alternative title for this puzzle?) and FALL TONES (52D: Autumn colors .. or an alternative title for this puzzle?)

The "scale" / "tone" answers:

• TUXEDO (19A: What a conductor might wear to a concert)
• PAVAROTTI (24A: One of a trio of famous tenors)
• CINDERELLA (28A: Rodgers and Hammerstein's only musical written for TV)
• "I TOLD YOU SO" (57A: 1988 #1 country hit for Randy Travis)
• WIZ KHALIFA (82A: Rapper who shares part of his name with the world's tallest building)
• "WHO AM I?" (107A: Question asked in a "Les Misérables" song)
• "THAT'S AMORE" (111A: Classic tune inspiring a joke about eels)
• GLISSANDO (123A: Musical slide)

Word of the Day: WIZ KHALIFA (82A) —

Cameron Jibril Thomaz (born September 8, 1987), better known by his stage name Wiz Khalifa, is an American rapper, singer and actor from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. [...] A tribute to his hometown of Pittsburgh, the song peaked atop the Billboard Hot 100 and received two Grammy Award nominations. "Black and Yellow," along with the top 40-charting singles "Roll Up" and "No Sleep" preceded the release of his third album and major label debut, Rolling Papers(2011). It was met with commercial success and peaked at number two on the Billboard 200, although critical response was mixed. [...] His fifth album, Blacc Hollywood (2014) became his first to debut atop the Billboard 200, and was supported by the lead single "We Dem Boyz." His 2015 single, "See You Again" (featuring Charlie Puth) was released for the soundtrack to the film Furious 7, in tribute to late actor Paul Walker. The song peaked the Billboard Hot 100 for 12 non-consecutive weeks, received diamond (14× platinum)certification by the Recording Industry Association of America(RIAA), earned three Grammy Award nominations, and remains Thomaz's most commercially successful release. His sixth album, Rolling Papers 2 (2018) matched its titular predecessor in chart position, and was supported by the sleeper hit single "Something New" (featuring Ty Dolla Sign). (wikipedia)

• • •

Ah yes, that famous scale, DO TI LA SO FA MI RE DO! I can't believe the scale wasn't in any kind of order [NOTE: I was wrong. It is in order, from bottom to top; stupid me with my top to bottom reading habits... so the SCALE goes DOWN in two ways; that makes this puzzle cleverer than I thought it was; my daughter came into town last night, so I was distracted ... is my excuse. Anyway, gonna leave the write-up as is. Sorry for the oversight]—should not have been hard to do—but then if it had been in order, the whole thing would've been far Far too easy, instead of merely too easy. I got the "DO" part, and then got SCALE DOWN, and that was basically the end of my thematic enjoyment and interest. I filled in the scale from top to bottom, in order ... but then that wasn't right, but it hardly mattered. Once you know the note placement is random, you can just go looking for the notes, ho hum no big deal. The second revealer, FALL TONES, was supposed to be a bonus, I guess, but it merely felt redundant, and anyway the term is FALL COLORS (or EARTH TONES). After I'd finished, I wondered why so many of the "themers" were songs, and only then did I notice that all the "themers" were musical in some fashion, although TUXEDO is a ssttrreettcchh—nothing inherently musical about TUXEDO; they had to force it to be musical through the cluing (which references a conductor's attire). You can tell that the theme kind of knows how weak it is by how many "bonus" elements it tries to throw at you—musical themers! a second revealer!—but in the end it's just a bunch of randomly placed two-letter "notes" turned down. Very weird to refer to those notes as a "scale" and then not arrange them in "scale" order. Very weird also to have the musical term CRESCENDO sitting dead center ... but with nothing thematic to do. Like the other themers just abandoned it there. "Hey ... hey guys, remember me? Guys? Come on ... hey, why does GLISSANDO get to be the second "DO," that's not fair! Fine, be that way! I'ma go hang out with Vanilla Ice and THE PIPS. They'll appreciate me!"

Also, it's SOL. Decades of crossword-solving have taught me that the note is SOL, not SO. DO RE ME FA SOL LA TI DO. Here, look:

xwordinfo.com

OK, some of those clues have nothing to do with music, but look at all the ones that do: [G, in C]; [Fifth note in an octave scale]; [Fa-la connector]. I know that "SO" is an acceptable variant, but I would've been a hair's breadth more impressed with this theme if it had pulled off a SOL instead of a mere SO. I guess there are no musical terms ending in SOL. Not a lot of songs about PARASOLs or LYSOL, I suppose. Ah well. 

I just went over to the puzzle website to make sure there was not some music or puzzle animation that I was missing. Apparently not, which seems slightly startling. They went to such great lengths to make those wheels spin last week that I thought for sure they'd do some big musical number, some song, dancing notes, god knows what. But nope, just gray squares and an out-of-order scale, just like my downloaded puzzle. Hmm, now that I look at the clues and grid a little more, it looks like the puzzle is so desperate to convince you there's really a theme here that it's trying to make As Many Clues as Possible into music clues. DOMO? MOPS? ANT? All of them (and more) getting musical treatment. I didn't notice. If the theme is weak, it's weak, and no amount of "bonus" stuff is gonna rescue it.

The fill is fine, OK, pretty average. CIERAS is less than lovely (bygone and plural?) (98D: Some Olds of old), but not much else made me wince. Well, HINKY, a little, especially crossing CIO (Chief Information Officer). And I had to say the ENACTED clue to myself over and over again before I could begin to understand it (7D: Written in code?). If you enact a law then it becomes part of the legal or penal or criminal code ... I think that's what the clue is going for. Also, HOUDINI was an escape artist so he ... got out ... of various forms of bondage (47D: Whose performances were as astonishing as all get-out?). I know Wynton and Branford Marsalis, but I did not know ELLIS (he's one of many accomplished musicians who died early in the COVID epidemic (see also John Prine and Adam Schlesinger, among others)). I was proud of myself for getting BANYANS off just the "B"—pretty sure I learned about the existence of those trees from crosswords, and that knowledge really paid off today (94D: Trees that can grow multiple acres wide). Speaking of knowledge I possess solely from solving crosswords—ALDO shoes! (115D: Footwear retailer founded in Montreal). And the word AGLARE, LOL, what? (22A: Gazing angrily). I mean, I know what, but still, what? Such a dumb word. Only mistake I made today was thinking that [What guacamole often costs] was EUROS. You cannot dispute that guacamole is sold in the E.U. and therefore often costs EUROS, so please respect my perfectly good if technically wrong answer, thank you, good day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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Unfair, to Brits / SAT 4-27-24 / Pistol used by James Bond / NASA rocket name since 1957 / Hybrid shape with straight edges and rounded corners / Modern driving aid / Company logo derived from a state symbol

Constructor: Rich Norris

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: Thomas NAST (11A: "Father of the American Cartoon") —

Thomas Nast (/næst/; German: [nast]; September 26, 1840 – December 7, 1902) was a German-born American caricaturist and editorial cartoonist often considered to be the "Father of the American Cartoon".

He was a sharp critic of "Boss" Tweed and the Tammany Hall Democratic party political machine. He created a modern version of Santa Claus (based on the traditional German figures of Saint Nicholas and Weihnachtsmann) and the political symbol of the elephant for the Republican Party (GOP). Contrary to popular belief, Nast did not create Uncle Sam (the male personification of the United States Federal Government), Columbia (the female personification of American values), or the Democratic donkey, although he did popularize those symbols through his artwork. Nast was associated with the magazine Harper's Weekly from 1859 to 1860 and from 1862 until 1886. Nast's influence was so widespread that Theodore Roosevelt once said, "Thomas Nast was our best teacher." (wikipedia)

• • •

I thought the term was "TIPSHEET" and I thought the term was "DOORMAN" and that pretty much sums up my experience with this one—slightly off my wavelength. Like a radio station I never can quite get to come in clearly. On the other hand, knowing the term "NOT CRICKET" finally came in handy (I'm married to a Kiwi, so some of these Briticisms make their way into my house and brain that way, though I'm not sure how I know this particular Briticism) (53A: Unfair, to Brits). But I didn't have many other solving smiles today, except maybe "SQUEE!" (38A: Excited outburst), which is kind of ADORBS. Most of the longer answers felt a bit bland (LOCAL PAPER, STEP-BY-STEP) or clunky / awkward (AT A PREMIUM, BOOK ON CD), or, like, DOPESHEETS and DOORKEEPER, from some parallel universe where the answers are all slightly off—eerily ... -ISH. Also lots of stuff I just don't know much about—numismatics, regattas, guns. I read a lot of crime fiction and watch a lot of crime films, so the WALTHER PPK is familiar to me (20A: Pistol used by James Bond), but as I was solving, the only part I could get (or remember) was the WALTHER part. "PPK" played like a bunch of random letters that I had to get from crosses. I've never seen the word SQUIRCLE in my life and I hope never to see it again (35D: Hybrid shape with straight edges and rounded corners) (just inferred the SQU- part after changing CLING to CLUMP (41A: Stick together)). I know Thomas NAST well from teaching courses on comics but note I said "comics" and not "cartoons"—when I see "cartoon" out of context, I think animation. So even something familiar (and highly crosswordesey) like NAST didn't come easily for me today. Still, there were enough gimmes to give me the traction I needed to finish this in a pretty normal Saturday time. It was a fitting challenge, but not a fun one. Hard to get excited about advertising logos (TEXACO STAR) and tech from circa 2010 (SIRI, ROKU, WAZE) (SIRI is the youngest of these (2011), that surprised me (WAZE = '06, ROKU = '02 (!?))).

Did you know that DUMBWAITER and DOORKEEPER have the same number of letters and both start with "D"? Well, presumably you knew the "D" part, but I was surprised when I tested DUMBWAITER and it fit and it was "confirmed" by PERK and (I thought) STES (52A: Penthouses, e.g.: Abbr. => APTS). But AKA really wanted to be AKA (39A: Blotter letters), which messed up DUMBWAITER, and finally REEBOK confirmed that no, it wasn't DUMBWAITER. Do upscale buildings even have DUMBWAITERs? Well, yes, if the buildings are older mansion-type things, then they do. I'm semi-satisfied by the aptness of my wrong answer. I don't think I fell into any other holes besides the DUMBWAITER hole. I did try to spell WAZE "WAYZ" (28D: Modern driving aid). I also typo'd Mad LIBS as "Mad LIPS," which had me wondering (for a minute or so!?) what the number PI could have to do with "some coins" (17A: Like some coins => BIMETALLIC). You ever have your own typo hold you up? Maddening.

Other stuff:

• 30A: Regatta leaders (COXES) — made two bad assumptions here—one, that the regatta had to do with sailboats (like most regattas I've ever heard of), and two, that "leaders" meant "the ones who are ahead of everyone else in the race" (as opposed to the person sitting in the boat "leading" the rowers).
• 33A: Things drawn in a group (LOTS) — wanted OXEN, but I think that's just because OXEN might "draw" a plow. 
• 7D: NASA rocket name since 1957 (ATLAS) — this is probably a gimme if you grew up during the Space Race. I don't know how I got this. It's vaguely familiar. Once I got the "T" and "S" it went in. I thought it was going to be something much more esoteric, somehow.
• 38D: Kind of snapper, for short? (SLR) — the snappers are back. Yesterday, they were long-haired (actually, long-tailed) turtles, today, cameras (single-lens reflex).
• 57A: B.C. and others (ERAS) — LOL what? The entire history of time before the putative birth of Christ is just one "era" now? That's like when Phoebe asks Rachel what period the (Pottery Barn) apothecary table is from and Rachel says "uh, it's from Yore ... like, the days of Yore, you know?"

See you Sunday, I hope.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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