POP MUSIC REVIEW : Roches’ Quirky Wit Plays to Emotions

There are a few advantages to being a cult favorite rather than a performer with a mass audience. For one thing, cult artists can count on their fans to be receptive when they try something new.

Arena denizens rarely risk it: Mick Fleetwood has said that Fleetwood Mac bombed when it tried playing the songs from “Rumours” live before the album was released and turned into a zillion-seller. The Roches, however, have not yet managed to infest any arenas.

So when Suzzy Roche, the youngest member of the all-sister trio from New York, announced that they’d be doing a lot of new songs Saturday night at the Coach House, the full house began to cheer. It’s not that the fans didn’t want to hear oldies dating back to the band’s 1979 debut; it’s that they knew they could throw away the road map and rely on the Roches to deliver them to an appealing place full of exquisite harmony deployed in the service of poignant emotion and quirky wit.

As it turned out, several of the trio’s five new songs went down a country byway--a direction hinted on in the Roches’ 1990 compilation of Christmas songs and in a recent backup vocal stint on country star Kathy Mattea’s latest album.

Not that the Roches are ready for Nashville--or vice versa. The country music machine isn’t big on irony or odd wrinkles, and the Roches are probably constitutionally incapable of ironing out their wrinkles.

The honchos in charge of the Nashville branch of the Roches’ label, MCA, probably aren’t out beating the bushes for a country song whose theme is “stand by your men .” But the Roches’ audience was all for “You’re the Two,” the group’s funny new country train-rhythm ditty about the (PG-rated) delights of a menage a trois.

The refrain went: “You’re the two that I want, some girls will settle for just one/They don’t know what they’re missing, they ain’t havin’ any fun.”

The punch line went: “With all this lovin,’ I feel wild and free/Maybe I should press my luck and try for three.”

(It was a nice touch that “You’re the Two” came right after a newly written confession of love and unfulfilled need entitled “You’re the One.”)

The Roches, who played as a trio with unobtrusive canned rhythm tracks as occasional backing, also went for laughs on “Ing,” an instant crowd favorite that may have exhausted half the gerundive rhymes in the English language. The song was based on a clever irony, using ing rhyme endings--linguistic tokens of action and forward movement--to paint a relationship that’s going absolutely nowhere. But you didn’t have to be a linguist to appreciate the glory of the echoing, pinging vocal effects that stood out during the song like the sound of crystalline rainwater.

For every humorous moment--Suzzy talking about how normal she’d become, while sounding as if she were about to nod off on Valium; Maggie, the silent, self-contained member, departing from type to frug her way through the Roches’ T-Rex fuzz-guitar tribute, “The Angry, Angry Man”--the Roches evened the balance with moments of sheer beauty, glowing warmth, and deep vulnerability.

For spine-tingling singing, there was the swell of aching voices that carried “On the Road to Fairfax County,” the technical achievement of the sisters singing discordant parts during “One Season,” and Terre’s high-wire walk during the trio’s rendition of “The Hallelujah Chorus.”

“Broken Places” was winning in its honesty about the difficulty of getting along with the people we care most about. The lyric reflects on how those who are close--including, no doubt, a certain trio of harmonizing sisters--can hurt each other in an instant because they are so aware of each other’s emotional soft spots, their “broken places.” But the song was ultimately about wanting to heal those breaks. Written by Maggie, sung by Suzzy, adorned with glistening electric guitar fills by Terre, it exemplified unity and a binding of complementary talents.

These days, too many arena stars are using canned backing (and even lead) vocals in concert. The usual excuse is that the fans want to hear songs sung the way they sound on record, and, after all, you can’t be expected to duplicate that live.

The Roches’ show gave the lie to that and recalled a fundamental truth: real singers can really sing. When the real thing is as grand as it was Saturday night, why should anyone ever settle for less?

A fourth Roche, youngest sibling David, opened with a brief solo set. Not surprisingly, he had a pleasing voice, with a hint of a burr offsetting his prevailing sweet tone. He emoted earnestly and tunefully, but the songs lacked the lyrical twists and musical hooks to make them stand out on first hearing. Roche also joined his sisters to sing Elton John’s “Daniel” late in their nearly two-hour show. Coming from the Roches, it was uncharacteristically ordinary stuff.