Drink Recipe - February 2024

[FKelly]

On the board with some help from the WSJ CPC zoom crew.
Thanks.

[Cindy N]

And on the board!

[rjy]

Stared, noodled, stared some more, duckduckwent a bit (they really need a verbable name!), then… aha! On the board

[Bird Lives]

it takes a bit longer when you've never heard of the song. Even after Googling and listening, I didn't recognize it. And IMHO, I didn't miss much.

[pjc]

After staring all week, I FINALLY got this! There was my own personal huge red herring in it that threw me (which I can't babble about until tomorrow).

[BethA]

I did notice the common letters BR & Y, fairly quickly, but was thinking along the lines that there would be a two-word song title with the same pattern. Having no other good leads, I just decided to look over the top 70s song lists. Close to the bottom of the list I was looking at, there it was!! BRandY! Great AHA moment!

I remember it when it first came out, but also thought that this would be pretty well-known and well-liked in recent times due to the Guardians of the Galaxy movies!

Also some trivia I recall is that Barry Manilow called his song “Mandy” because Brandy was already a popular song!

[kurtalert]

Ugh. Never heard of the song. Noticed BR/Y, but thought perhaps it was really just BY- and that was pointing me to the 6 clues in the puzzle that contained the word "by"- some of which were really strangely clued, seemingly- to me, anyway- in a way that meant they were forcing the word into clues to make them part of the meta. Also searched far & wide for cocktails with B Y initials, and cocktails made with ingredients that started with B and Y. Nope. Oh well.

[damefox]

Ugh. Never heard of the song.

I'm perhaps a bit young to be judging this, but I might quibble with the claim that this song is "well-known." I've heard it, but I really don't remember how I became familiar with it, and has it been played on the radio ever in the last several decades? (I do listen to oldies stations, but that's not where I've heard it.) Maybe this song was well-known *in the 70s*, but is it really reasonable to call it well-known today? Songs from the 70s that still qualify as well known are, like, "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Landslide," "Stayin' Alive," etc. This song is a ways down the list in terms of 70s songs that are still well-known today. If the prompt hadn't insisted the answer was a "well-known song," the puzzle might even have been easier, because I'm sure some people got to the answer and thought to themselves "well this can't be it because I've never heard of this song." It was a fun aha moment when I realized what was going on though, and it's nice when the answer makes the title make sense in fun way.

[hoover]

Ooohkay. I just listened to a clip of the song, and I had heard it, but as with most songs I hear, even the most popular, I couldn't tell you the name of the song or who sings it. After all, it was only through this board and the meta puzzles I've encountered here that I have learned the names of the only two Taylor Swift songs whose titles I have heard of. I think they might be BLANK SPACE and SHAKE IT OFF? Funny thing, I was sitting in the barber chair this weekend and some female singer was yodeling or whatever and I heard the words "blank space" and thought, gee, is that what Taylor Swift sounds like? Anyway. I don't listen to a whole lot of music.

[kurtalert]

Ugh. Never heard of the song.

I'm perhaps a bit young to be judging this, but I might quibble with the claim that this song is "well-known." I've heard it, but I really don't remember how I became familiar with it, and has it been played on the radio ever in the last several decades? (I do listen to oldies stations, but that's not where I've heard it.) Maybe this song was well-known *in the 70s*, but is it really reasonable to call it well-known today? Songs from the 70s that still qualify as well known are, like, "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Landslide," "Stayin' Alive," etc. This song is a ways down the list in terms of 70s songs that are still well-known today. If the prompt hadn't insisted the answer was a "well-known song," the puzzle might even have been easier, because I'm sure some people got to the answer and thought to themselves "well this can't be it because I've never heard of this song." It was a fun aha moment when I realized what was going on though, and it's nice when the answer makes the title make sense in fun way.

Even without knowing the song, though- I do feel like I should have gotten it. Given that I saw the BR and Y common word starts, and the title was drink recipe... if I'd been a little less of a dunce and figured out the AND, I should have gotten to BRANDY, and then it's off to Google with "70s song brandy", which makes for an easy confirmation that this was indeed a popular song back then. I frequently miss these seemingly obvious parts of metanisms. I really need to try solving more of these with a cheat sheet for a whole bunch of different things to keep an eye out for, tricks to try, subtle language clues in the title, etc.

[bhamren]

I personally found this the worst meta I have done in a long time. I saw the BR....Y or B....Y and I thought there were 3:
Big Yellow Taxi based off the B Y (first rabbit hole and kind of weak)
Then I thought maybe BY (not BR Y) so it is By By kind of like Bye Bye Miss American Pie (which is what I submitted). The drink recipe is "good old boys drinkin' whiskey and rye"
Then there is Brandy. But I think the "Y" should have been at the end of the second word rather than the first.

This goes back to why I have not liked MMMM for a few years now - there is TOO MUCH emphasis put on knowing obscure songs. (Brandy is not obscure, but on a general level). My music appreciation is actually almost EXCLUSIVELY from the 60's through early 80's (I am 64). There was NOTHING else that differentiated between American Pie and Brandy as being the answer - nothing in the clues OR the answers.

I would post this directly to Pete Muller but don't know how. I would like a real answer to why Brandy is better than American Pie. American Pie was a way better known song than Brandy. Don't get me wrong - I had a niece that was named Brandi in the 1970's because of this!! But it was not a sold click and I do not cheat at all via the Forum, etc.

[damefox]

Ugh. Never heard of the song.

I'm perhaps a bit young to be judging this, but I might quibble with the claim that this song is "well-known." ... If the prompt hadn't insisted the answer was a "well-known song," the puzzle might even have been easier, because I'm sure some people got to the answer and thought to themselves "well this can't be it because I've never heard of this song."

Even without knowing the song, though- I do feel like I should have gotten it. Given that I saw the BR and Y common word starts, and the title was drink recipe... if I'd been a little less of a dunce and figured out the AND, I should have gotten to BRANDY, and then it's off to Google with "70s song brandy", which makes for an easy confirmation that this was indeed a popular song back then.

There's definitely a large number of songs that fall somewhere between "well-known" and "obscure." I don't think this song is obscure, so it's not unfair to expect solvers to get it. As you say it's an easy Google confirmation. But "easy Google confirmation" should not be necessary if the song is indeed "well-known," and I think that might be what tripped some people up. It's always interesting to me what pieces of the puzzle make or break a meta, and I haven't seen one in a while where the difficulty rests this much on the prompt. If this hadn't been an MMMM puzzle and the prompt had been "the answer is a drink," I think the solver rate would've been much higher.

[Cindy N]

One thing I have found helps when I'm stuck. I write out what I have as if I was asking for a nudge - whether I am or not. So I would have listed the themers, and what I noticed - that they started with BR and Y, etc. I often at least begin the solve as I'm writing out. If not, when I read back what I have written gets things going.

Does that work all the time? Absolutely not. But it has helped enough that it's definitely in my "what to do when I'm stuck" wheelhouse.