Sussman Lawrence

Minneapolis, Minnesota
Sussman Lawrence was a band led by Peter Himmelman on lead vocals and guitar, with his cousin Jeff Victor on keyboards and backup vocals. Both had previously performed as the only white members in Minneapolis soul singer Alexander O'Neal's band. Saxophonist Eric Moen, bass guitarist Al Wolovitch, and drummer Andrew Kamman rounded out the group, which formed in the late ‘70s and took its name from a character on Steamroller, a local public-access television comedy show that Himmelman hosted.
The members of Sussman Lawrence had all gone to junior high school together in the Minneapolis suburb of St. Louis Park. Heavily influenced by Jimi Hendrix and Bob Marley, Himmelman brought a pronounced reggae/ska flavor to their debut album Hail To The Modern Hero! and then embellished it on the more polished and ambitiously pop-oriented follow up, the double LP Pop City. Both albums fueled Sussman Lawrence’s incendiary live shows with such fan favorites as “House on Fire, ” “Baby Let Me Be Your Cigarette, ” “Closer, Closer, ” and “The Fifth of August”—a love song that would resurface on Himmelman’s 1994 album Skin.