If I'm understanding this correctly, you want the curve to affect the position of the letters, but not the rotation?
The long way around would be to convert the text to a shape, then separate each letter (ungroup), select them all and switch to the Freehand tool, and create a brush using those shapes. Draw a line with them, then click Edit Brush, set spacing as needed, and turn off Rotation along the path. The size of the letters would be determined by the width of the line. The problem with this is that the height of letters would be equalized, so it wouldn't work so well if you have capital & lowercase letters.
-- Ben
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