Sum 41 was just about everywhere during my final year of high school all the way back in 2002. The band’s appearance on the soundtracks for both the first Spider-Man film as well as the second American Pie movie coupled with the near constant airplay on MuchMusic made it damn near impossible to get away from them. I guess this worked out for me as like most eighteen year olds at the time, I loved their music. That said, my intense fandom was short lived for me to be honest, as I sort of checked out following their third album “Does This Look Infected?” in 2003. Aside from a few singles on the radio, they went completely off my radar.

In April of 2013, I had tickets to see them play live alongside headliner Billy Talent during their stop in Halifax. Sum 41 pulled out of that show (and were subsequently replaced by Monster Truck), but I wasn’t aware of why until now. Turns out the band had been on the ropes and it didn’t look like they would be continuing following the departure of long-time drummer Steve “Stevo32” Jocz. These days, the band is once again producing new music and in the middle of a final tour (minus Stevo) that is set to wrap up in January of 2025. For the first time, lead singer Deryck Whibley recounts the rise, fall, and rise again of both himself and the band with his memoir WALKING DISASTER.

Deryck’s book is a wild ride to say the least. The fact that he is still alive today is completely mind-blowing given the level of drugs and alcohol he subjected himself to over a near twenty-year period. There is also the sexual and mental abuse suffered at the hands of the band’s long-time producer and manager Greig Nori; something that has taken the music world by storm since revealed in the pages of this book. Those parts were especially difficult to read at times and made worse by the fact that Deryck felt he couldn’t tell anyone, even years after the abuse stopped.

I was completely unaware of the partying that Whibley and his bandmates were up to during their most intense popularity. Leaving trashed hotel rooms in their wake, fueled by ungodly amounts of drugs and alcohol were commonplace incidents for the first half of their career. Even life off the road wasn’t any easier for Whibley as his relationships with both Paris Hilton and Avril Lavigne were tabloid fodder that left him with little to no private life. There’s even a story of a photographer who buried himself underground inside Avril and Deryck’s wedding venue the day before the ceremony. Unbelievable stuff.

I listened to this one, so I’d recommend the audiobook as there are moments where Deryck plays stripped-down versions of Sum 41 songs as well as a handful of cameos by musicians who read the quotes attributed to them. If you’re a fan of rock memoirs, this is one of the more intense ones I have read in recent years.