Alan Lewandowski (guitar,vocals), Lee Smookler (vocals), Brian Dean Richmond (bass), Greg Pierce (guitar)
Influences
Hank Sr., Ray Price, the Ronettes, Jack Teagarden, Louis Armstrong, Leadbelly, Ma Rainey, The Seekers, the troubador tradition, the Bumps, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Townes van Zandt
From a humid center of rolling hills, the Working Poor perform rock n' roll songs born of the greater Pittsburgh land mass and waterways, chthonic, pagan responses to the vexing terrain and social climate of the area. Lo-fi rock n' roll, classic country ghosts, the folk blues ghosts of the ghosts, girl group high romance, late expressionism, comic old world poetry, and desperate literature from urban dust.
The band unites two musicians who are also heavyweights of the Pittsburgh visual arts world. Greg Pierce of Orgone Cinema plays mesmerizing Stunted Electric Guitar, while painter/filmmaker Brian Dean Richmond plays haunted and honky-tonked upright bass. Harmony Vocalist and Arrangement Director Lee Smookler is the city's leading author of New Oral Literature. He can also sing a 440 A in BDR's voice. They join Composer, Vocalist and Thud Acoustic Guitarist Alan Lewandowski; a mentally ill writer of Z Fiction and Acreative Non-Poetry.
The band is known for song-obsessed riots of spirits high and low.
New EP, Eat the Middle Class is now available. A popular music rip up. 6 of the band's best-loved songs recorded and mixed live to stereo in the studio by co-conspirator John Johnston( of the Telefonics from Erie).
The cd covers were handprinted by Third Termite Press; one of the classiest outfits in Pittsburgh. This is their third collaboration with the WP.
pick up your copy at Paul's, Desolation Row, the Big Idea, or contact Alan at aanitafix@hotmail.com
Also look for Signed Anonymous(1997), WP EP(2002), New Wealth(2004), and Come Down for Your Silver(2006).
http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/bschles/My%20Webs/index.htm
BIG BIG DO-OPS and PRO-POX TO THE WO-PO POs (NO WOPS/NO HOMO) JK SEZ READ THE PRE-COGS! LOVE (NO ONO) HOME NO DINO LESS ENO (MORE WOPS/MORE HOMOZ) LOVE YER YA YAs! CHEERZ GLITZ
Hey Allen~ Here’s what I have been working on…a Sculpture Series of symmetrical, 3-dimensional fabric forms, each made singularly from a one-piece pattern, cut, layered, sewn and assembled called...
