AL AND SADIE IN THE BACK ROOM. Back in September, I was wondering whether I should see Singing Sadie and Al Duvall at Freddy's Back Room in Brooklyn. And though it might have been hard to tell from my post at the time, I was also struggling to dredge up a memory of a certain cartoon character who belts it out just like Sadie.

Well, I went to the Back Room, saw Al and Sadie, and enjoyed each of their acts as well as the little routines they performed together. Afterwards, Sadie kindly autographed her CD for me by pressing her lips to the cover, leaving behind a fetching but smearable puckerprint. Sadie was a great sport as I struggled to take a decent snapshot of her.













As for the Back Room, it’s a great old bohemian bar that’s apparently threatened by the Ratner development plan championed by Mayor Bloomberg. There are all sorts of protest messages inside and outside the bar.













Here’s a Back Room calendar, which includes a monthly spelling bee! And here are (mostly) upcoming appearances by Al and Singing Sadie, who are scheduled to do a Ramones tribute(!) and play CBGB too. (Perhaps they have a thing for endangered watering holes.)

As for the cartoon character who belts just like Sadie, a culturally sophisticated friend (it's always good to have one "on call") nailed it as Little Red Riding Hood from the Bugs Bunny cartoon “Little Red Riding Rabbit.” As we laughingly remembered that one, I sped down the "information superhighway" to find the lyrics, which I now share with you:

The five o'clock whistle's on the blink
The whistle won't blow, and whattya think
My pappy's still in a factory
'Cause he don't know what time, it happens to be!

Sadie, if you take requests, this is the one I'd like to hear from you!

Photos: David Marc Fischer