Don Pyle’s tantalizing memoir, Rough Description, recalls first bands, the absurdity and incredible rewards of touring, and dubious-dealing stories of the groups he’s been in, most prominently as drummer and co-founder of beloved group Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet. It recounts friend and work relationships with musician Dallas Good, venerable producer/engineer Steve Albini, iconic comedy troupe Kids in the Hall, whose series and theme his group created, and others.

Alternately melancholic and hilarious, this book chronicles Pyle’s bonkers experiences while attending hair school, his evolving relationship with his mother, how the Ramones affected his young teen brain, a life-changing car accident, and other situations from a creative life lived fully, providing oodles of salacious dish. You’ll discover how a punk rock pen pal led to a career in showbiz and how to put out the same record over and over again.

Photography, performing and writing music in bands, recording and producing numerous other artists, writing about music, and scoring for film and TV are all part of Pyle’s distinct observer’s eye — one that sees all creative media as aspects of the same stream.

Available from ECW Press

Don Pyle is a Toronto artist, working primarily in music, sound, photography and writing. The band Long Branch, in which he has played with Sally Lee, Lisa Myers, and Laura Pitkanen since 2014, released their second album, Arc of the Sun, in July 2025. He has released numerous records with other bands he has been a part of, including Phono-Comb, Greek Buck, Black Heel Marks, The Filthy Gaze of Europe, Fifth Column, King Cobb Steelie, and Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet. His early photographs of the beginning of punk in Toronto, starting at age 14 in 1976, were the foundation of his first photography exhibition, Trouble In The Camera Club, at The Beaver in Toronto in 2008. He’s written about music for Eye, Now and Exclaim! magazine, and was the sex advice columnist for a local paper for a year. He recently signed with ECW Press for the publication of his third book, Rough Description

About the Author

Bryen Dunn is a freelance journalist based in Toronto with a focus on tourism, lifestyle, entertainment and community issues. He has written several travel articles and has an extensive portfolio of celebrity interviews with musicians, actors and other public personalities. He’s willing to take on any assignments of interest, attend parties with free booze, listen to rants, and travel the world in search of the great unknown. He’s eager to discover the new, remember the past, and look into the future.