The fifth MMMM of the year challenged solvers to find a rock band with numerous hits in the ’80s. The last word of each of the five theme entries forms the first word of a well-known band’s name; the second halves of these band names appear as the first words of clues of other entries throughout the grid. Putting “the band back together,” as hinted at by the title, yields the following:

The first letters of the five shared words spell out S-T-R-A-Y, and applying the “get the band back together” mechanism to “Stray” gives the band Stray Cats, this month’s meta answer. Solvers found confirmation in the puzzle’s clue for CEE, [“Cats” opener]. As a bonus, the five entries with clues beginning with the shared words (from top to bottom) point to another word:

The first letters of these entries spell out S-T-R-U-T, and “Stray Cat Strut” is one of the Stray Cats’ biggest hits, and also this month’s cover song.

Meta Song:

Per usual for our covers, we alloted three hours to learn, arrange, and record the song, this time with the Kindred Souls plus three awesome horn players. Thanks to Chris Morgan who filmed a fun video, adding a couple of appropriate sound effects at the tail end. Pun intended 🙂 Enjoy!

Selected Solver Comments:

Brent Holman   Thanks, gang. I enjoyed the “strut” as an extra flex!

Pair-o-Ducks   Thank goodness for Black Sabbath! All the other bands involved in the puzzle are new to me (as in, never even heard the name). On the bright side, I now have lots of new bands to listen to and discover 🙂 

Burak O’Drama   Never heard of this band, but I’m glad I’ve heard of all five theme entry bands because otherwise this would’ve been a very difficult puzzle to crack!

Tade   A very well crafted puzzle … My favorite Meta of the year so far.

sym   Took a few days, very satisfying when it clicked.

Alternative Music Clues:

DIS suggests cluing MIXER as [Soundboard] and DROOD as [Title character of a Rupert Holmes musical].

Redhead64 suggests cluing LBJ as [“Went to the White House, showed ___ his butt” (lyrics to Weird Al’s “Gump”)] and KEL as [Mitchell who performed “We’re All Dudes” with Less Than Jake on the “Good Burger” soundtrack].

Evan suggests cluing UTICA as [New York birthplace of Sanctuary lead singer Joseph Michael] and OMANI as [Like many Royal Opera House Muscat patrons].

Groaners:

Laurabrarian   MMMMeow!

Chaddog   …stop me if you’ve heard this before, but I spent a lot of time looking for company before finally finding religion.

Allan Patterson   Like a Phantom, my search for a Rocker was going nowhere…until I drank a Se(l)tzer.

Totals this month:

230 correct, 145 incorrect

Rating: 4.16 out of 5 stars

Difficulty: 3.79 out of 5

Monthly mug winner:  Scottpb

Thanks to Matt Gaffney for blogging the puzzle at Crossword Fiend, where you can rate the puzzle (thanks!) and/or leave a comment.

Thanks to Tamara Brenner for the graphic.

Thanks for playing and see you next month!