Four of 12 imams of Shia / WED 6-7-15 / Red Lobster freebie / Amused singer of Raise Your Glass / Coke Zero alternative / Nickname for high-achieving couple

Constructor: Julian Lim

Relative difficulty:Very very easy


THEME: Mononymous singers— familiar phrases that contain words that are also the names of one-named singers; answers are clued wackily, as if they had something to do w/ said singers...

Theme answers:

• TICKLED PINK (17A: Amused the singer of "Raise Your Glass"?) (I do not know that song)
  
• PRINCE CHARMING (25A: Enchantment of the singer of "Raspberry Beret"?)
• PRO BONO (35A: Favoring the singer of "Sunday Bloody Sunday"?)
• STING OPERATION (42A: Medical procedure for the singer of "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free"?)
• TRAINED SEAL (57A: Coached the singer of "Kiss From a Rose"?) 

Word of the Day: Kevin DURANT (5A: Kevin who was the 2014 N.B.A. M.V.P.) —

Kevin Wayne Durant (born September 29, 1988) is an American professional basketball player who currently plays with the Oklahoma City Thunder of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He has played the small forward position for the Thunder, formerly the Seattle SuperSonics. Durant has won an NBA Most Valuable Player Award, four NBA scoring titles, the NBA Rookie of the Year Award, and an Olympic gold medal. He has also been selected to five All-NBA teams and six All-Star teams. (wikipedia)

Solved this faster than both the Tuesday and the Monday puzzles, so ... not sure what happened there, but I think this one's clued Much too easily. I was getting theme answers just by looking at the answers w/ a handful of crosses in place. Never saw clue for DYNAMIC DUO because I had the tail end and just wrote in the rest—what else was ...-ICD-O gonna be? I like Chagall's work so MARC = gimme. I watched a lot of "Friends" so MATT = gimme. I do a lot of crosswords so TEK = gimme. Etc. This thing didn't push back At All. Took me a little while to see exactly what the theme was, but that's just because I didn't have much time to think about it—I was too busy filling in answers as fast as I could type them. I wrote in DARN for DAMN (23D: "Aw, hell!").  I think that is literally the only "mistake" I made all puzzle. I'm kind of on the fence about the theme. It's just one-named singers whose names are in familiar phrases. That doesn't strike me as that interesting or ambitious. But it's probably just playful enough to pass muster. But (but!) the fill was a little south of good. My mood never quite recovered after I got DIETRC :( and LRON :( :( one after the other. ABMS OOP ORSO ALGA ULAN. It's just a bit clanky. First rate Scrabble-f*cking in the SW. So it's a mild negative from me today, I think. But very, very mild.


Gotta get back to baseball now. When I came up here, it was the 6th inning and Houston was up 2-0 on the Yankees. Let's see what it is now ... whoa, looks like Houston increased its lead to 3-0. Still, that could disappear in a hurry. Gotta get back to watching it live. I've got picture from ESPN and audio from Astros radio. Best of both worlds (if I mute the commercials). Later...

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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