He’s been called “punk rock’s answer to Bukowski,” “Wattie with a typewriter,” and “the tattooed bard of East Hastings Street,” (okay, I made that one up.) In recent years, Chris Walter has built a reputation as one of Canada's most prolific and outspoken literary voices.

Since the turn of this century, he's been pumping out books on his own steam at the excellent GoFuckYourself Press. He’s penned it all: autobiographical anguish (both hilarious and poignant), band bios the mainstream was too afraid to touch, and, my favorite, gritty novels about the denizens of Vancouver’s troubled Downtown Eastside.

He's got a new book out, this time detailing the troubled saga of Canada's infamous SNFU. (It's available at punkbooks.com along with all of Chris’s other titles. Treat yourself and take a look.) Between penning brutal fiction from the down and dirty streets of East Vancouver and putting out biographic juggernauts like What No One Else Wanted to Say, Chris found the time to answer a few questions …

You've been puttin' stuff out steady for years now (twenty-one Chris Walter releases on GFY, at last count), both fiction and the biographies. How does the work load compare between the two?

Obviously, the music biographies are much more work because they’re longer and I have to interviews strangers to get the story. Let’s just say that punk musicians aren’t always the most reliable people around when it comes to deadlines and things like that. I’ve had subjects leave on tour without even bothering to tell me. Fiction is easy and fun. You just sit there making up a bunch of lies.

How does the SNFU book differ from your other biographies?

It’s 50,000 words longer, for one thing. This time, I didn’t put impose an unrealistic deadline on myself, and I went into much greater detail. Along with the twenty-one various band members, I also interviewed roadies, merch guys, managers, and even fans of the band. Only one of the ex-band member declined to be interviewed, which means that I spoke with the other twenty. It was fuckload of work, in other words. I’m still kinda decompressing from it.

How much of the story arc is tied to the tragic and bizarre life of Chi Pig?

The book is about the history of the band, but as its frontman, Chi Pig commands a far larger portion than, say, the fifth drummer. Chi’s downward trajectory was hard to write about at times, and there were some very sad moments. I wanted the book to end on a positive note, but even though SNFU is on tour as we speak, I’m not very optimistic about the future. Chi was in detox for a while, but he didn’t stay long, and his health is not great. I just hope he can pull back from the abyss before it is too late.

It took a while for this one to come out, how much blood, sweat, and tears went into piecing together the sometimes-fractured history SNFU?

It took ten months of ten-twelve hour days, (maybe five or six hours on weekends) just to write this book, and another three or four months to edit, so the process was challenging. There were times when I wasn’t sure if I would actually finish. Chi Pig doesn’t even have a phone, so I had to track him down in various East Side bars for interviews. At one point, he disappeared for a month, and I had to move on anyway. His voice would have been louder if he wasn’t so hard to reach. Chi supplied the important details I needed, but I wish he had been more accessible. Still, I’m pleased with the way the book turned out, and I know it’s easily my strongest biography.

A good portion of your writing takes place on the Downtown Eastside, describing the ongoing gentrification. Is that neighborhood in constant flux, or has it always been the rough and tumble place you write about?

Since the neighborhood is part of the downtown area, the real estate is potentially is very valuable if they can get rid of the junkies. They’re trying, too. Developers built a huge condo complex where the old Woodward’s department store used to be, and now you see BMWs and Beemers parked on East Hastings outside fleabag SROs and dive bars. Gentrification is slowly but surely claiming the ‘hood, and long-term residents have no choice but to move farther east to outlying suburbs such as Surrey. Unfortunately, those suburbs are also trying to get rid of “undesirables,” and there are fewer and fewer hotel rooms available. The future is bleak, unless you’re a yuppie.

I’ve been told you work down at the First United Church in Vancouver’s DTES, are you still putting in time there?

I volunteer at the FUC shelter on Friday nights, and it will be three years in September. I hand out rigs, socks, soap, blankets, and other sundries to those who need them. Unfortunately, the low barrier shelter is in a constant state of flux as the City hacks away at its budget. They fed lots of money into it while the Olympics were here to get homeless people off the street, but now that it’s over, they don’t care as much about the problem. Funny how that works. I love being at the shelter though, and not just because it provides material for future books. I was on the other side of that window once, and I’d rather be handing out rigs and socks than receiving them. I see a lot of funny things, and the people are amazing, but the reality of addiction and homelessness is fucking brutal.

Beyond the autobiographical stuff, there’s a ring of truth that resonates through your work. How important is it for a writer to have lived what he writes?

I can’t speak for other writers, but obviously, it’s easier to write about things you know. Maybe I could write about the problems of the rich if I tried. I mean, it must suck for when the clutch goes on the Ferrari and you have to drive the Porsche. I just happen to be obsessively interested in drugs and punk rock, even though I’ve been drug-free for more than eleven years. Besides, there are already plenty of yuppies writing book for yuppies. Sometimes I feel as if I’m the only person doing what I’m doing.

The survivors of the punk era are often presumed to be uninterested in reading. How has it been creating your own demographic?

I’ve always managed to sell enough books to pay the bills and keep going, but I wish I had access to a larger market. The local press won’t have anything to so with me, and it’s very hard to get into stores with a name like Gofuckyerself Press. I made up that name as a joke fifteen years ago, and it was never meant to be an actual working title. I should have changed it years ago, and as much satisfaction I got from it at times, I know it has cost me plenty in commercial terms. I have no idea how many opportunities I’ve missed because of that name, but I have to let it go if I want to survive.

In this last year, you've begun a foray into the e-book market. How's that coming? Can we expect to see more of your titles out in the e-book format?

I have four titles available as e-books currently, but I’m not making much money on them yet. Soon I’m going to make all my books accessible electronically, and then I’ll look into various ways to market them. The potential to reach new readers worldwide is great because they won’t have to pay ridiculous Canadian shipping fees. The prices costs go up every year, making it increasingly difficult to sell books outside of Canada. Lemmy from Motorhead had it right when he said, “I don’t like it much. All things come to he who waits, but these days most things suck.”

Why can't I find your books on the shelf in the USA, damn it?

Many Americans are very peculiar in that they don’t want to read books set in other countries, especially Canada, which they seem to regard as some hick backwater. While I agree with them in some respects, it’s hard to sell books there. A large number of Canadian writers set their books in the US in an effort to crack the potentially lucrative market, but I think that’s fucking lame. I write books about the people and cities I know, and I don’t think it matters where a book is set as long as the characters are strong. That said, I do sell books online and ship them around the world, just not in the quantities I would like to see. Maybe the e-books will help with that.

Word on the street is that your book, Langside, has been optioned as a TV series. What's the real deal there?

I have no idea what’s going on with that project. Whenever I give the TV series up for dead, I get another email from the producers telling me they’re still working on it. I’ve had other books optioned for movies, but other than a few cheques, nothing happened with those, either. At this point, I’m not holding my breath.

Do you still do readings and live appearances?

We’re touring Canada with the SNFU book this summer, but I can’t even enter the USA thanks to some bullshit that happened a million years ago. Uncle Sam doesn’t forgive or forget.

The next book, fact or fiction?

Fiction. I’m into the first chapter of Chasing the Dragon, but the transition from music journalism to fiction is a bit tough, and I’m still trying to readjust. I think it’ll take a week or two before I really hit my stride, and I may have to re-write earlier parts when my mojo fully returns. Sometimes I just have to plug away until the fire starts to burn.

A few years ago, it dawned on me that writing was actually my real job, and that I had to keep producing new books if I wanted to live indoors, but even that realization failed to spoil it for me. I wake up each morning looking forward to my battle with the keyboard, and I hope someday to write something of real value. If I ever do, I’m sure it will be by accident, but I can live with that. In fact, I better get back to “work” now.

Tom Pitts is a San Francisco writer. His novella, Piggyback, is being published by Snubnose Press later this year. Find more of his work at http://tom-pitts.blogspot.com/