Chris' suggestions are excellent and I encourage you to investigate and experiment. Using the Background and Foreground layers is not something that every PB developer is familiar with.
Tip: When working with a DWObject assigned to either the background or foreground layers, pretend the normal bands (header, detail, footer, etc.) are not there. Even though the bands are visible and you can continue to interact with them and with objects assigned to the Band layer, the background and foreground layers are each like a sheet of transparency film that covers the entire Painter. With a little experimentation, you'll quickly see what I mean.
If I may also provide some additional information about Escapement:
This property is found at the bottom of the "Font" tab in the Properties pane of the DW Painter (See PB Help topic "Font.Escapement property" for more information). You have to set its value using the Expression dialog window, but the expression can be simply an integer value. Escapement is expressed in tenths of a degree (450 = 45 degrees). Positive rotation is counter-clockwise. Normally, the rotation is applied to the baseline of the text, but this depends on the text alignment setting (refer to Help).
Please note that escapement is only applied/seen in the DW Painter in the preview pane (and of course, at runtime)... in other words, the text DWObject(s) that have escapement will appear in the Painter as normal, with no escapement. This is the way it works. I believe this is why you are required to define escapement as an expression.
Good luck!
Regards,
Sally Li