Richie Rich and The Poor People

Richie Rich and the Poor People was formed in the summer of 2008 with two members. Rob Bettega, an accomplished musician in the Houston independent rock scene met Dan Peck through a mutual friend on a New York City College Campus. Dan Peck was a drummer from Philadelphia who had been playing shows at colleges and parties. The two bonded on their love of music, and even though their musical backgrounds were very different, made arrangements to start playing together almost immediately. Their first jam session was at Gibson Studios, where they practiced with a few friends. It wasn't until February that the third member of the band was introduced. Jon Kalish, the lead guitarist made his appearance during their session at Roxy Sound Studio, and he brought a hell of a lot to the table. With the ability to flawlessly play anything from Slayer's Raining Blood, to Johnny B. Goode. The fledgeling band had an immediate and pretty undeniable chemistry. Their personalities seemed to click and so did their music. Even though each member of the band brought a completely unique musical identity to the table, Richie Rich always found a way to be conclusive and intentional. Even while constantly fucking with genre barriers, both through their reinventions of popular songs and through their heavily lyrical, musically diverse originals.
One practice that Richie Rich and the Poor People embraced through their time together is taking on temporary members into the band. Though the original three members (Rob, Dan and Jon) remain a constant in the band, a great deal of the bands music comes from outside musicians that serve as fair weather members of the band. Or in shittier cases straight up temporary members. This keeps the bands direction in some way out of control. Although i have never seen the band become dissonant or unorganized. They just all seem to thrive on that unpredictability, and have all become masters at wrestling it to the ground and making it their bitch.