Quiz Crossword
1 Salve (8) 2 A direct hit (5-3) 3 Monarch’s chair (6) 4 In need of company (6) 5 Deeply religious (6) 6 Destiny (4) 11 Renegade (8) 12 Type of footballer (8) 15 Freedom from danger (6) 16 Particles of snow (6) 17 Colouring stick (6) 20 Forearm bone (4) Down: - 1 Era. 2 Ingot. 3 Upstage. 4 Tendon. 5 Eraser. 7 Discloses. 8 Blackpool. 12 Envelop. 14 Tripod. 15 Horses. 17 Ridge. 20 Ear.
- 1 Stains. 5 Comets. 10 Admit. 11 Auditoria. 12 Vulnerable. 13 Nail. 15 Animus. 17 Barnyard. 19 Basecamp. 20 Guitar. 23 Gold. 24 Melancholy. 27 Methodist. 28 Iliad. 29 Brutal. 30 Canine. Down: - 2 Tamil. 3 In the lurch. 4 Shaman. 5 Cadillac. 6 Mate. 7 Tore apart. 8 Salvia. 9 Ballad. 14 Injunction. 16 Insulator. 18 Imperial. 19 Bigamy. 21 Riyadh. 22 Baltic. 25 Orion. 26 Loft. 4 Blake, director of the 1963 film The Pink Panther (7) 8 1950 short story collection by Isaac Asimov (1,5) 9 and 22 1988 Sidney Lumet film starring Christine Lahti and River Phoenix (7,2,5) 10 Woody, Milwaukee-born bandleader and jazz musician who died in 1987 (6) 11 John, Scottish inventor of a type of road surface (6) 12 Industrial city in NW Texas, US associated with oil refining (8) 18 Miguel, cyclist who won the Tour de France in five consecutive years from 1991-95 (8) 20 Kind of dark tea grown in China that is partly fermented before being dried (6) 21 Any of various Australian trees or shrubs of the genus Acacia (6) 22 See 9 23 Small Asian tree, Cydonia oblonga, with edible pearshaped fruits (6) 24 Olivia, author of the novels The Rain Forest and School for Love (7) 1 and 2 1970 novel by Irwin Shaw (4,3,4,3) 2 See 1 3 Giovanni Battista, 19th Century Italian astronomer who pioneered the spectroscopy of comets (6) 5 Scott, golfer who won the 2004 Volvo PGA Championship (8) 6 In classical mythology, a Trojan prince and son of Aphrodite who escaped the sack of Troy (6) 7 King of Scotland killed by Macbeth in 1040 (6) 13 Margaret, Best Actress in a Supporting Role Oscar nominee for The Go-Between (8) 14 A cocktail of gin and dry vermouth (7) 15 River rising in Russia near Smolensk that flows south to the Black Sea (7) 16 Convex transparent membrane that forms the anterior covering of the eyeball (6) 17 James, English navy lieutenant born in Exeter, Devon who was known as “the Blind Traveller” (6) 19 Seventh planet from the sun (6) Across: - 1 Port Moresby. 9 Omo. 10 Trattoria. 11 Ceres. 13 Harvard. 14 Oregon. 16 Remora. 18 Stentor. 19 Scala. 20 Ulan Bator. 21 Chi. 22 Herring gull.
“I like love songs, I can write a ballad, but I use music to also speak about social issues.”
And it’s his life experience as a workingclass man that steers him in this direction. From a teenager trying to earn some money, to working hard-labour construction jobs, to his resolve to obtain a university degree.
“I started chasing music at 16. I got hold of my brother’s guitar and learnt how to play. I could make $50 a night if I did a certain number of sets, so I started to play and write my own music and that’s how it started for me.
“We do music for love, for money, for recognition, but we also do it because it’s fun to do. Music has that kind of value for me.”
Seemingly passionate about upcoming young artists, Rodriguez has much to share with them: “I think it’s good for young bloods (youth) to invest in themselves at a young age. I am self-taught on guitar, but I also got a formal education. English is my second language. I learnt how to speak English and communicate.
“And it’s important because my core fan base is English-speaking so that was my target audience. It took me 10 years to do my fouryear degree in philosophy, but I did it.”
He graduated from Wayne State University (Detroit) in 1981 with a BA in Philosophy.
“Young bloods can do it. It’s a global market now. Before, we’d try to please the manager at the lounge down the street to get a gig. But now it’s global and this changes everything. It opens up so much opportunity. Anyone who starts doing music, like all the young bloods out there, they reinvent music all over again.”
On his passion for the blue collar sector of society – as is heard in his music or the many times he’s campaigned for city and state political offices in Detroit – he says it’s because he “knows the feeling”.
“I think it’s a personal evolution. Education, information and knowledge are all the same thing. But I think the real thing is enlightenment – when it reaches your conscience. Once you can take care of your mental hierarchy of needs, then you can take care of others. When the political and social issues reach your conscience, how can you ignore it?”
And on this note we chat about a number of issues, from the drought plaguing South Africa, to why governments should cancel student fees and “free those young bloods from that taxing kind of pressure”, to racism and poverty.
But even on these topics, Rodriguez is optimistic and never stops contemplating.
“When you use the word ‘hope’, I think that’s a good thing to have, but I’m all for getting beyond cheerleading, something more tangible, like education. Beyond the emotional side, I think it’s hard to think out of the box or get out of the box.
“It’s a mental box for some. For some it’s an environmental box, maybe it’s economics that keep people on their crosses.
My philosophy is that there is plenty for everyone and, in fact, too much for everyone, but opportunity is there for everyone.” 1 Scrap, litter (4) 2 Recreational sailors (9) 3 Germane, pertinent (7) 4 Working dough (8) 5 Publicly withdraw a statement (6) 6 Christening (7) 7 Belief (5) 8 Of flesh that is decaying after injury or disease (10) 13 Fair and square (5-5) 16 Metallic element, resistant to corrosion (9) 17 Green vegetable (8) 19 Attenuated, tall and slender (7) 21 Oblivious (7) 22 Put aside, remove from consideration (6) 24 Sour fruit (5) 26 Substances used to stain fabric (4)
- 2 Lilac. 3 Misaligned. 4 Yonder. 5 Highbrow. 6 Jute. 7 Champagne. 8 Pallor. 9 Glitzsy. 14 Dilettante. 16 Soliloquy. 18 Silently. 19 Behead. 21 Averse. 22 Zealot. 25 Boxer. 26 Fiji. Down: - 2 Ono. 3 Titus. 4 Orache. 5 Euterpe. 6 Barbarosa. 7 Hot cross bun. 8 Saudi Arabia. 12 Roeselare. 15 October. 17 Bruton. 19 Scrag. 21 Cal.