Added: 4 years ago
From: carrolly2k
Views: 121,635
Sort by time | Sort by thread (beta)

Link to this comment:

Share to:
see all

All Comments (224)

Sign In or Sign Up now to post a comment!
  • they are so good.

  • I spent 47 years begging people not to play with other peoples emotions. I failed and I will soon be with God.....I wish all my love on those who need or deserve it....I failed you.

  • If I had ever met a woman who had a soul and was not a cheat.......I would kill myself today. I am in the pits of despair and I cannot be dying with anyone other than these beautiful ladies and songs. Thankyou ladies for helping me for 30 years..........goodbye ladies you sang like angels. My eyes are squirting tears and I cannot bear it. Bye and thankyou for the love

  • I used to listen to them over and over and over as young boy. 42yrs young this Feb. Such great, powerful melodies/messages.....love them.

  • one of my favourite songs of all time  loved these brilliant irish american ladies for the last 35 years or so

  • 30 years later........wow

  • There's no B3 on this whole thing. I want my 4:48 back. Cool intentional 1/4 tone dissonance though.

  • This'll be played at my funeral - for everyone who's said goodbye to someone.

  • @EyecareBacklog1 that is MY request... have seen them dozens of time in NYC and elsewhere; their first two albums are ingrained in my DNA. What a special gift they are.  It is sad that they have stopped doing their Christmas show but this time of year especially, their voice is sorely mised. We love you Maggie, Terre and Suzy!!!

  • I remember my older sister playing this song as a child and for years googled "If you go down to heaven" , it's nice hearing the correct version!

  • Saw them in '86,here in Philly...was hanging out with them backstage,after the show...Cool as Shit man....They're really down to earth...

  • How about someone providing tha album version with the searing guitar solo by Robert Fripp, who also produced the record.

  • Of course their harmonies are brilliant, but what I always loved was when they sang in unison. Only sisters could sing in that kind of perfect unison. I love these girls.

  • After reading all the debate on here regarding what the song's about...it's very obviously about Reggie Hammond, sung from Ganz's point of view

  • IS this song about someone going to the Hammond Rugby tournament or simply about a girl going to visit someone at SE Louisiana State? Anyone?

  • holy fuckin shit.... awesome

  • Tears in my eyes. Takes me back and what fabulous singing

  • I like Hammond (Luisiana) and the Song!

  • they are a bit off key at times arent t hey...

  • I guess I can relate being I've lived in Hammond my whole life

  • It sounds like they don't have a very high opinion of that guy in Hammond.

  • Absolutely extraordinary.

  • AWH!!!! Brings me back to the sixties in Hanford Bay!!! Fantastic!!!!

  • @stcourtney OOOPPPPS THUNDAR BAY!!!!!!

  • I'm not sure if I someday want to understand this music, or not.

  • they r badass

  • Stunning, beautiful voices. I kinda miss the wonderful Robert Fripp guitar part, but even without it this is awesome

  • Wow, great singing from Suzy.

  • The Roches are sublime! These three sisters are GODDESSES, pure and simple!

  • The Hammond song. I bet they got the name from  using a hammond organ on it. They started off with that as a working title/nick name, and it stuck.

  • @MartyChilla No Hammond Organ here. The song refers to the town of Hammond Louisiana and a young woman's choice to follow a man there. I think the guy was attending Southeastern Louisiana University there.

  • Wow

  • Hammond Indiana< where the music school is.

  • In the early 1970's my late brother, Greg Ellison, came to visit with me in Hammond, Louisiana. He founded the Lotus Temple to teach Tai Chi and Kung Fu. Maggie and Terre came for a visit. They stayed many months, thus the "You'll never come back!" I can be reached at sales@mrtool.net. Keith Ellison

  • Hammond, Oregon, a lovely brutal spot near the Cape Dissapointment, in Oregon, where the Columbia river meets the Pacific Ocean. There's an old shipwreck there on the beach.

  • definitely spiritual

  • That chord they sing (at around the 2:57 mark) on the line "if you go with that fella" gives me the chills

  • @mordecaicarroll, I get goosebumps and teary at that same place EVERY TIME. What remarkable talent!

  • best live show I've ever seen.

  • @Forestski I can second that.

  • @Jojoseahorse Good luck. I knew of the Roches thru Robert Fripp, but didn't get hooked until I saw this very Soundstage broadcast. It was "The Married Men" that got me. Being a man, I recognized the truth in those lyrics. Last saw them at the Bottom Line in the late 90's. One day I'll be in my late 90's....

  • @NickleLark As will we all! Peace :)

  • The lyrics are a conversation between parents and daughter. If you've raised a daughter, understanding it comes naturally.

  • @NickleLark That's so true! Believe it or not, I first heard this song on the radio in Scotland in 1980 and was mesmerised. I was a teenager then and no-one had heard of the Roches. Now I live in NY with teen daughters, and I'm living those lyrics :)

  • Rhonda, I went in 1981 and have never been able to forget you.

  • Unbelievable. Such harmony is rare to come across. Thanks. Outstanding!

  • If you go down to Hammond you'll never come back In my opinion you're on the wrong track We'll always love you but that's not the point If you go with that fella forget about us As far as I'm concerned that would be just throwing yourself away not even trying Come on you're lying to me Well I went down to Hammond I did as I pleased I ain't the only one who's got this disease Why don't you face the fact you old upstart We fall apart You'd be okay if you'd just stay in school
  • I'm a teenager and am in LOVE with the Roches. Who spell their last name R-O-C-H-eeeeeeeeeeee

  • their lyrics always make me sort of feel like i'm reading someone else's diary.

  • The theme of the song is an old one - stay away from him, he's bad for you vs I'll do what I please. "Hammond" is just some place where she's going to meet him; it echoes innumerable old folk-blues songs about going down to this place or that (usually no more meaningful to non-Southerners than Hammond).

  • Beauty...

  • MegDragonfly13 -- listen to their song "We." They pronounce it themselves.

  • i wore this record OUT in high school. the whole thing was genius. love them so much. thanks for posting this clip.

  • utterly incredible

    how wonderful

  • maggie, terri, and suzzi, wow, always the best, just wish the sound quality was better

  • They make the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sound like Tiny Tim.

  • If this is the band that started out as "White Women" I played drums for them in the late seventies.

  • love those somewhat weird harmonies.

  • @swampzoid

    Yes, "somewhat weird harmonies" of theirs give us two contradictory feelings; one comes from the lyrics with its straight or tame understanding, the other is implied also in the lyrics but with ironic understanding.

    Their song lyrics and harmonies always worked on us in this way.

    One of the most intelligent groups in NYC around 1980!

  • I opened a show for them in 1980. they were not really very nice people. but god, they sure could write and sing!

  • You opened for them in 1980?... You were seven years old! WOW!!

  • I was 28 years old when I opened for them in Syracuse NY.

  • Comment removed

  • Robert Fripp did a song with Terre singing on it called Mary. Just beautifully transcendent.

  • Terre did all the female vocals on that album: Exposure, well worth a listen to. Fripp produced the album Hammond is from and laid guitar parts that are obviously Fripp.

  • @zabman23 fripp the best

  • @zabman23 - Fripp also produced the Roches' 3rd album "Keep On Doing" while Adrian Belew was working on a solo album. During a few songs, such as the title track, Fripp brought in Tony Levin and Bill Bruford to do some bass and incidental percussion. It's wild to think that behind the beautiful and quirky Roches, lurks King Crimson. I love knowing that when I listen to that CD.

  • @mdstmprs I didn't know that, but you're right, it is great knowing there's a bit of Crimson in The Roches.

  • i wish i lived in the 1980s.

  • I hate to say it, but I heard them do this when I was 20 in 1981 sitting in a big tent at the Winnipeg Folk Festival swooning at their feet when they just brought the album out with 250 other people falling in love with each of them i rapid fire while they sang and played guitars and sang

    Maggy, no Terre, no Suzzy, no Maggie, no

    Terre...

    I learned it, and have played it every year since,

    once in Mabou Harbour Cape Breton for dinner

    once to get laid

    and so many times just for joy

  • Loved that.

  • I was once working at a hotel in London when I was called up to Suzi Roach's room. Her radiator had devleoped a slight leak from the top valve. It was August and the weather was mild, so I turned the radiator off and offered a change of room.

    She declined and instead asked me if I could recomennded a good restaurant nearby.

    I sent her to the Pink Oboe on Fulham Palace Road.

    The following day she told the meal was wonderful. She had the shrimp and the steak.

  • Awesome!

  • love you Roche sisters,

    with or without Robert Fripp;

    you groove me to tears.

  • Tempo a bit fast, still brilliant. Love it!

  • love, love, LOVE these gals

  • This song takes me way back to 1980 when I disovered them. Glad to see other fans out there. The harmonies are ground breaking IMHO. Singing with them is like a spiritual experience.

  • @WhatWouldZappaSay You're happily lucky, I guess. I only discovered The Roches yet (I mean recently!) after reading the sleeve of Exposure by Robert Fripp. Some things I missed in the '70's and '80s, so I'm glad I've opportunty enough to (re)discover now. The Roches represent (a.o.) things I missed: it makes me melancholic and wistful: the Hammond Song will be on my funeral shortlist...

  • the tempo is a bit too fast but they still sound exactly the same as the album.

    great song to play on guitar ^___^

  • :) ...

  • goosebumps

  • Really. Beautiful vocal arrangement, marvelous voices. Always loved this song. I kind of miss the Fripp guitar solo, but what the heck? Great post.

  • Wow, thanks for posting! I'm somewhere in that audience!

  • Such pure voices...

  • yay, How to Be!

    Great song, thanks for uploading!

  • That song is in the movie "How to be" Robert Pattinson is in it

  • no duh!

  • @HSMSTAR so sad that the artists recorded their songs on 70s warner bros. not knowing that they would use them on some dumb hollywood movie 30 years later

  • I saw them in Port Dover Canada this year, small hall, 4th row, they seem to have only deepened as people and they could still sing lovely. Suzzy's daughter (with Louden Wainright 3), has a fantastic pure voice and spirit, she opened for them, Lucy Wainright Roche - check her out. I also saw them in a tent at the Winnipeg Folk Festival in 1982, just after "The Roches" came out.

  • Rutgers University 1982

  • i love that song!!!

  • "Where is 'on down the line?'-How far away?" Great song & live rendition though I do miss Robert Fripp's guitar line from the album. Refresh my memory-which sis is which??? Love ya Roches!

  • From left to right: Terre, Maggie, Suzzy. Will always Love the girls. Thanks for posting carolly2k.

  • No. From left to right: Terre, Suzzy, Maggie on guitar.

    Close but no guitar. ;-)

  • Hey Holdenon3 - Yeah, you're right. I must have been dyslexic when I wrote that. Thanks. I've seen them 4 times, so I DO know. I even fell in Love with Suzzy one night at the Bottom Line . . . not that SHE noticed. LOL

  • I saw the Roches at the Bottom Line at least twice--wow, did I love them! Once Suzzy was way pregnant with Lucy, and took a rest under the piano while Maggie and Terre sang.

  • Hey jimmy605,

    Cool - I might have been at one of those shows! Saw then twice at the Bottom Line myself. Fripp even sat in for a couple songs at one of them.

  • syr1811--Saw them once at Town Hall or City Center (it was a long time ago, maybe 1983), with Fripp, the best show by far of the four or five I saw, even though it wasn't as intimate as the Bottom Line ones. Remember how you could barely see the stage at the Bottom Line bec. of all the cigarette smoke?

  • "We'll always love you, but..." Beautiful, heart-piercing song, one of my favorites. Their vocal control is astounding. I'd never seen them perform live; thank you for posting.

  • Terre Roch taught me how to play the guitar! Pretty cool to see a renewed interest in The Roches as a result of a little indie film.

  • Aren't you the lucky duck!

    Sorry to hear that they aren't performing much anymore.

  • how to be was amazing and this song is pure gold :) <3 wow.

  • Great great song...reminds me of ABBA in seventies...

  • i love this song, every time i listen to it i get How To Be movie flashbacks .

  • me too

  • Its really cute song and its in the movie with robert pattison How To Be is a friggen awesome!

  • Stunning

  • Wow, they just sound amazing together. Extremely talented.

  • i love this song with a passion.

  • AMAZING.

  • This is pretty amazing.

  • i miss the time when bands were valued based on substance instead of looks.

  • the blond was hot back in the day tho

  • Man, I love these girls.... I drove from Minnesota to Vermont with them on cassette in a Fiat 128 sedan.

  • Maggie and Terre and Suzzy.

    We'll always love you.

    But -- that' not the point.

    :~)

    Cate

  • anyone know where i can download this song? im obsessed with it :)

  • WOW! This song is AmaZin!!! I can't wait to see How To Be, but I don't know where I can watch it.

  • How To Be :)

    i've fallen in love with this song.

    Robert Pattinson!

  • Ok so I like the song .I've listened to it like a dozen times watching the trailer of "How to be" .... But I am sure I'll appreciate it more if someone can tell us more about the lyrics? ..What they actually mean ?

    I would really be grateful if someone can tell me who is Hammond ? " I know ..It's pathetic" but I've already googled the song trying to figure it out ...I just didn't find anything ..

  • Hammond is a town in the state of Louisiana.

  • I believe it was Suzzy who was romantically involved with a musician from the New Orleans area. Hammond is about an hour northeast of New Orleans.

  • @MissEnas as i understand it, it's a relatively true story about how one of the sisters left the group to be with a man, and after she came back they wrote this song about the whole affair.

  • @MissEnas Indiana...it's a place...Hammond, Indiana

  • @MissEnas  I think Hammond is a place.

  • God, I love this song.

    To me, understanding it precisely isn't required. I enjoy that it's an obscure, snapshot of two people's personal communication. It's lines could be found in any of our personal expostulations with loved ones, small details shifted.

    Immortality for the Roches.

  • @MissEnas

    God, I love this song.

    To me, understanding it precisely isn't required. I enjoy that it's an obscure, snapshot of two people's personal communication. It's lines could be found in any of our personal expostulations with loved ones, small details shifted.

    Immortality for the Roches.

  • @MissEnas

    haha i think i love you. hahaha i was thinking the exact same thing but i had the same problem as u....didnt wanna be thawt of as an idiot :| haha

  • ohmygahd this song was in how to be! i loved that movie! robert is pretty epic<3

    great song btw. ive been looking for this song foreverr.

  • I'm still looking I can't find the album version :'(

  • where did you see it?! I AM DYING TO WATCH IT

  • i saw it a while back at the rhode island film festival. but no need to fret, the movie was recently picked up by ifc and its going to be distributed here in the states =]

  • Aw okay, but I live in denmark. Guess I'll just have to wait D:

  • how to beeee

    that trailer made me cry :)

  • I like this song alot, and i love "losing true" even more.. but seriously how do you pronounce the last name? I've heard it said like Rock, Roach, and Rosh. How does it work?!

  • Sounds like the name of the bug plural.

  • Oh thank you so much!

  • Oh they're so good. I wish I wasn't born in the 90's. They're that good. Gah, I just ordered their first CD online and can't wait to get it.

  • This brings back so many memories. I first heard them in Santa Fe in 1979 and became a big huge fan fast. We called them "punk folk" at that time, not knowing what else to call their music. I saw them play in Oberlin Ohio a few years later, and met them backstage. They autographed my copy of the "Keep On Doin'" album, which I still have. I saw them 5 or 6 (or 7) times after that --- I lost count --- and met them once or twice more. The Roches will always live in my heart and mind. Great group.

  • Really great video, well produced. Good job Carrolly, thanks.

  • Just amazing :)

  • got it from "How To Be"

    amazing song

  • (:

    lovee it.

  • Incredible :)! they sound amazing!!!

  • on how to be trailer love it

  • This made me break out my copy of the first LP..on vinyl..start to finish. Thank you so much for posting this.

  • Found this out by 'How to be' trailer and its amazing!

  • How To Be is the Best Movie ^^

    Looove Rob x3

  • the tempo here is much faster than on the cd

  • Just discovered them...I'm falling in love

  • love this album and esp this song! terrific upload - thanks ever so

  • One of my all-time favourites!

  • They're incredible -- always have been, always will be.

  • theis harmony is simply irrestible as well as the purity of their voices. their music is timeless, the first time i heard it i though it was some new group i'd never heard of.

  • such a haunting song. the first time i heard it, i think i teared up. love it.

  • Roches gave us a strange feeling with their beautiful but curious harmony and with their ironical double-meaning lyrics, that we were growing up but also were losing something under the growth. This strange feeling was widely being understood among young 'Village' residents of NYC, who were definitely not born in the place. It was an era that US was looking for new directions to go, leaving the old era behind.

  • Yes, a thousand times, yes! I am testament to Your theory. Born elsewhere, moved to NYC in '86, discovered the "Roches" through friends I made, and never really appreciated them until now, 2007-8. Although I bought their albums then, and listened , I don't think I had the respect then that I have now. Funny, how how time plays on the psyche!

  • They are beautiful...musical weavers, the voices just twine in and out...lovely.

  • Forever True, The Roches! Beautiful music from beautiful people!

  • some of the best harmonies ever...i discovered them in 1986 in denver colorado...the blond was hot back in the day...

  • Found this song on the HOW TO BE trailer, and loved it :D

  • Yeah, it really fits that trailer. ;D

  • babies roches babies

    let's make some

    seriously i've listened to this song like 70 times in my itunes alone

  • Really lovely harmonies - and incredibly well put together

  • i heard this song on a trailer (how to be) and i fell in love with it!!!! their voices are persistent...i like that.

  • Criminallly underated band. Would love to hear them do 'runs in the family'.

  • fantastic

  • Amazing and beautiful

  • It's like listening to angels

  • Great song! I was waiting for Fripp to start playing.

  • they went to my school

  • wow,i forgot about the coluorfield, the singer was in the specials

  • Yes, Terry Hall was in The Specials, Fun Boy Three and then The Colourfield. He's always spoken of his liking for The Roches.

  • for pure 'lights off , bazoom' experience , you have to try the Colourfield cover - quite hard to listen to sometimes when things are tough , almost too much...