Just for fun, I printed today's puzzle out and solved it the old-fashioned way. So much slower this way! And no catchy little jingle at the end. But ultimately quite satisfying - I should do it more often.
Working down the grid, it quickly became apparent what was going on. The four longest Across entries each have two letter groups highlighted with heavy borders, and the first one, "Standard musical progression", revealed itself as PENTA[TONIC]SC[ALE] (brackets mine). Next was "High court judge?" (my favourite clue today!) as [CHAI][RUM]PIRE. And so on. Clearly there are drinks embedded in these answers! By the time I reached the revealer "Requirement at some comedy clubs", the answer was a write-in : TWODRINKMINIMUM. Hah! I suppose this makes sense, to make the crowd more receptive, though it might have the same effect on belligerence. And surely you wouldn't see much CHAI at a comedy club? What do I know. Haven't seen a comedy show in decades.
It's a mixed bag in the rest of the grid. There are four all-consonant answers (CCCP, KGS, MTN, TBS and TCBY), which seems a bit much. Interesting wrinkle in 39D "Term of friendship for a French woman" - MONAMIE looks weird, with the masculine possessive in front of a clearly feminine word, but that's what you do when the word begins with a vowel. (Try saying "MA AMIE"!) I'd never heard of the term "gut course" to describe an EASY A. I think we used to call them "bird courses", back in the day.
Back atcha tomorrow!
-philbo
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