WHISPER
puzzle by sudokusnydictation.com
By Kurt Krauss
©2020 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
02/12/20
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
02/12/20
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
Release Date: Wednesday, February 12, 2020
ACROSS
1 Home on the
range
6 Hardly wimpy
11 Film watcher’s
channel
14 Take the honey
and run
15 “Encore!”
16 Évian water
17 *Power outage
standbys
19 Digital readout,
for short
20 Up the creek
21 “I, Claudius” star
Jacobi
23 RSVP part
24 *“I don’t care if
you made plans,
cancel them”
28 Airplane
assignment
31 Escape
32 Man-to-man
defense
alternative
33 Treat like a dog?
35 Place for a “ped”
to cross
38 Bobbsey girl
39 *Morally upright
person
43 __-fi
44 Big rig
45 Bandleader
Lombardo
46 Beanery sign
48 Ticker tape
letters?
50 Award adjective
53 *Stretch between
two Bushes
57 “Huh!?”
59 __ squash
60 Language
spoken by Jesus
63 Bygone airline
64 Ballpark
brushback,
perhaps ... and a
hint to each set of
circled letters
67 Rock’s
Fleetwood __
68 Code name
69 Driving
instructor’s urgent
reminder
70 “Hometown
Proud”
supermarket
chain
71 Weapon with
a hilt
72 Fills completely
DOWN
1 TV host Philbin
2 “Jagged
Little Pill”
co-songwriter
Morissette
3 Old register key
4 They report to
sgts.
5 Pile
6 Barbie’s
company
7 Get on in years
8 Aries or Taurus
9 Like many yoga
practitioners
10 Beginning
11 Ringer in la
casa
12 Wool coat
that is often
plaid
13 Something to
chew
18 Holiday quaff
22 Cartoonist
Chast
25 Source of
increased
government
revenue
26 Overlook
27 Common base
29 Auto financing
abbr.
30 Afternoon affairs
34 Even score
36 Pester
37 Pub __: casual
fare
39 Rascal
40 Bolivian border
lake
41 Fed. agents
42 Deli choice
43 Brief time
47 __-Caps: candy
49 Marked for the
class
51 Go after, as a fly
52 “The Masked
Singer” judge
Robin
54 Cuts back
55 Currently airing
56 “All bets __ off”
58 Flu symptoms
61 LAPD alerts
62 Actress Sorvino
63 Texter’s “No
more details!”
65 Sellout letters
66 Leb. neighbor
SUDOKU
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3
5
9
9
7
8
4
1
4
2
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7
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WHISPER
Introducing the
“Tara is just a rat back-
wards, who likes cheese
anyways”
DAILY MIDWESTERN COLUMN
The musical roots
of the Midwest
MAXWELL SCHWARZ
Daily Midwestern Columnist
The world would be a mighty
silent place had it not been for
Little Walter wailing on a harp
with Muddy Waters egging
him on in Chicago come 1950
or thereabouts. In that instant,
the Chicago Blues were born —
urban blues, electric blues. The
sound filled Chicago and it came
to define it. It was the moment
when the music of the Midwest
was born. This is to say nothing
of the influence of other artists,
such as Duluth-native Robert
Zimmerman, better known as
Bob Dylan, of course.
Which is all to say the
Midwest has sound. It trembles.
There is music in these roads,
nestled deep in these pines. It is
folk, it is country, it is the great
Americana backbeat pressing
back against your tires as you
cruise up I-94 through Madison,
WI. From Minnesota’s own
Jayhawks (who produced the
masterpieces
“Hollywood
Town Hall” and “Mockingbird
Time”) to Allison Krauss —
the queen of Americana who
hails from Decatur, Illinois. To
those artists whose boots are
dirty and sounds are rich, to
those reclaiming country from
Nashville and putting it back in
the Heartland where it belongs,
I do tip my hat.
We have a hillbilly-tinted
concept
of
country
music,
dominated by fake twang and
pop sentimentality. Country
music may have been born in
Bristol, Tennessee, but that kind
of music was meant for folks all
over every stretch of America
to which a dirt road leads you.
The Midwest is dotted with
rust towns and green towns
and towns where the wheat
swallows up old tractors and
metal Tonka trucks. There are
all sorts of Midwesterners to
whom country music sounds
like home. Take, for example,
the guy who fixed my tire when I
was stranded in Onaway. Or my
dad, who walks his property on
the weekends and checks to see
how much maple sap collected
in the buckets for him to make
maple syrup. Even this guy I
once saw drinking a Budweiser
and driving a tractor down 29
Mile. These are country folk.
You can see it in their eyes.
Michigan
band
Frontier
Ruckus
has
been
steadily
putting out what I can only refer
to
as
criminally-underrated
folk-Americana
since
2007.
I cannot recommend “Way
Upstate
&
the
Crippled
Summer,” both parts 1 and 2,
enough. Frontman Matthew
Milia’s warbling, intense lyrics
find a cozy nook in between the
banjos and rusty chords.
Lord Huron — an LA-based
indie folk crew made up of
Michigan natives — produces
some of my favorite music,
by far. Their debut album,
“Lonesome Dreams,” has just
enough distant ambience to
remind you of how beautiful
the loneliness of nature can be.
“She Lit a Fire” is particularly
striking, with dancing, sparkly
chords that blend into the
ambience.
Their
sophomore
album, “Strange Trails,” plays
heavy to a country-rock vibe.
Tunes like “Meet Me in the
Woods” and “Love Like Ghosts”
are
spectral
and
haunting,
buried
deeply
within
the
mythos of solitude peppering
Michigan’s natural splendors.
Yet, the heart of Midwestern
roots
is
Minnesota
—
specifically the Twin Cities.
For proof, grace your eardrums
with Garrison Keillor’s folk
spectacle
“A
Prairie
Home
Companion,” which played live
from the Fitzgerald Theater
in St. Paul. The show has since
been
renamed
“Live
From
Here,” with Punch Brothers
frontman Chris Thile taking
over hosting duties. Essentially,
the show features skits, music
and performances by folk, blues
and Americana artists of all
kinds, oftentimes performing
twangy impromptu renditions
of newer songs.
Read more online at
michigandaily.com
COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW
Salvant and Diehl prove jazz is
still relevent at the Mendelssohn
NATALIE KASTNER
Daily Arts Writer
There are few moments in our
fleeting lives that lead us to be struck
with gratitude: the birth of a child,
true love, near death miracles, and
for me, the concert of Cecile Mclorin
Salvant and Aaron Diehl. There was a
moment during a very beautiful étude
that Aaron Diehl played, right after
an acapella vocal section by Salvant,
where I could not stop smiling, even
in the middle of February, in the
thralls of seasonal depression.
The young duo, exquisitely artistic-
looking and effervescently endearing
in their charisma, played two shows
at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater
Thursday night. This performance
acted as a jam session elevated to its
highest form. As I walked into the
theater, a very jolly usher handed me
a program and with a wink said, “The
program is, there is no program.”
Diehl and Salvant riffed off of each
other for which song they wanted
to perform next. It was obvious how
well the couple knew one another.
Within a few seconds of suggesting
a song, the two were off and running
with one fabulous arrangement after
the other.
When I think of jazz, the first
thing that comes to mind is not
necessarily the storytelling. I think
of smokey dark rooms with men
crouched over their instruments all
in rhythm with each other. With the
performance by Diehl and Salvant
I saw a new side of jazz. Each song
was a story. Salvant was constantly
making specifically informed choices
with her voice to tell a story. It wasn’t
just the lyrics. She would cry out one
section and chew the words out in
another. At her most passionate, her
voice enveloped the Mendelssohn
with a warmth that I did not think
could be mastered by someone at
the age of 30. Salvant’s velvet voice
shifted qualities effortlessly and
with complete control. It wasn’t her
standing and singing before us, her
whole body contorted and shifted to
compliment the sound.
Diehl matched her in artistic
mastery, but was far more subdued
in his performance. He only stood
to bow once during the show when
he modestly gave us a smile, but the
rest of the show we only got to see his
profile as he concentrated on the keys
— this added to the enchantment of
his sound. When the lyrics fell short
as a result of their old-fashioned
nature, Diehl filled in the subtext. In
a song like Burt Bacharach and Hal
David’s “Wives and Lovers,” which
is obviously past its time, Diehl was
able to reinvigorate the story through
his musical accompaniment. It made
these beloved standards relevant
again; his performance was not just
a rote rendition but a commentary on
the place of these songs in the world
today.
Even though I am a lover of the
“Great American Songbook,” I can’t
help but cringe at how outdated some
of the songs are. Diehl reworked
these tunes into ones worthy of the
21st century again. By manipulating
the music that backdropped lyrics
about a cozy “cottage for two,” Diehl
illustrated
the
coercive
themes
present in many of these songs,
exemplifying how vocal jazz can
survive the rapidly-changing culture.
The
second-to-last
tune
they
played was in honor of their friend
who was a drummer. Salvant didn’t
go into what happened, but it was
obviously something tragic because
the
following
performance
was
incandescent. Even with the flu
going around and people coughing
throughout the night, there was not
a single sound through the 10 minute
segment. The room was silent in
reverie.
The way Salvant set up the evening
allowed for that sacred experience
at the end. Throughout the show,
she spoke to us as if we were a close
friend she had just met at a coffee
shop. She spoke about awkward
romantic experiences, her favorite
artists and her friendship with Diehl
as if we deserved to know, and not
like we all bought a ticket to see a
Thelonious Monk winner. She was
charming, endearingly innocent and
authentic.
Both Salvant and Diehl are off
to the next town, but their impact
will stay with me. The good news
is, Salvant was here last year too, so
chances are she will stop by again.
Hopefully along with Diehl.
With the performance
of Diehl and Salvant I
saw a new side of jazz.
Each song was a story
TV REVIEW
JUSTIN POLLACK
Daily Arts Writer
It’s unfair to compare NBC’s new comedy
“Indebted” to the recently departed “The
Good Place” just because they’re both NBC
comedies that air on Thursdays. These
shows have little in common — nowhere are
their differences more evident than in the
execution of their respective premises. “The
Good Place” took one of the most complex
sitcom premises on network television and
accomplished it with ease. On the other end
of the sitcom spectrum, “Indebted” takes
one of the most basic premises and struggles
to give its audience a reason to care.
Dave (Adam Pally, “The Mandalorian”)
and Rebecca (Abby Elliott, “How I Met
Your Mother”) are excited to “get their
closets back.” They are finally moving
out of the toddler phase of parenting, and
starting to reclaim their adult lives. Then
Dave’s parents show up with unnecessarily
complicated stories about how they are in
debt because they love vacations and have
no health insurance. Also, Dave has a sister
(Jessy Hodges, “Barry”) who is nothing
more than a pile of lesbian stereotypes
with no characterization. “Indebted” is
constructed around a simple narrative — a
relatively young couple has to deal with the
man’s socially unaware and clingy parents.
The whole episode should’ve
raised the eyebrows of parents
everywhere.
Filming in front of a live-
studio audience makes multi-
camera television different than
single-camera, as the actors
must be more performative.
The parents, played by Steven
Weber (“13 Reasons Why”) and
Fran Drescher (“The Nanny”),
seem much more comfortable
than Pally and Elliot. But that
doesn’t excuse what feels like
relatively cheap dialogue. As
misunderstood as technology
is by grandparents, dialogue like “the
tweeter” and “airBLT” ha the sole purpose
of getting uninspired canned laughter from
Drescher’s character. The loudest laughs
are reserved for anytime one of the parents
makes a simple statement about sex, which
the writers must assume is inherently funny
simply because the characters are old.
It remains uncertain if the show will ever
recognize the potential that “Indebted” has
to contribute to the discourse about cost
of healthcare in the United States and the
parenting styles of Millennials and Boomers.
I couldn’t tell you how Dave’s parents
moving in will affect their lives, why his
parents have no concept of savings or what
any of the characters do for a living. Simply
put, the table-setting is just horrible.
I am hoping that the lack of character-
based humor in favor of repetitive gags could
just be a symptom of it being the pilot. For the
show to succeed, it must spend more time
on building the histories of the characters,
which the pilot spent zero time on. Based on
this first episode, Dave seems to be relatively
unaffected by the carefree lifestyle of his
parents. The most successful version of this
show would focus on how the parents spent
their way into massive debt and how their
efforts to spoil Dave and his sister impacted
each of them respectively. Unfortunately,
after one episode, NBC gives us no reason to
care.
‘Indebted’ is weak,
uninspired comedy
NBC
6 — Wednesday, February 12, 2020
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com