Dave Bidini still remembers it all like it happened yesterday, which is a good reason to get everything down on paper now, especially if rock 'n' roll is your game.

And music is Bidini's primary game and business, although the 35-year-old singer and rhythm guitarist for the Rheostatics has been known to rip off a few rifts with his pen. Bidini contributes regularly to the Toronto Star, and when his band toured across Canada with The Tragically Hip in the winter of 1996 in support of The Hip's Trouble At The Henhouse album, he kept a diary of the journey, parts of which were serialized in the Star.

Those highway diaries form the backbone of a new book, On A Cold Road: Tales Of Adventure In Canadian Rock (McClelland&Stewart, $19.99), in which Bidini intersperses his experiences on The Hip tour with the thoughts and anecdotes of 50 of the best-known homegrown musicians, managers and promoters this country has produced.

The book underscores a long-held and widely tested notion about music in this country -- that it's a lot easier to be Canadian and make it big in the music business than it is to make it big in the music business by being Canadian. But it's not from a lack of trying.

The cast of characters is stellar -- members of April Wine, the Guess Who, the Stampeders, Max Webster, BTO, Triumph as well as Jerry Doucette, Ken Tobias and many others recalling some of the ridiculous and quaint tales collected traversing Canada.

"They had really good stories. A lot of our stories were bereft of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll and that sort of thing," said Bidini, who was in Burlington on Monday night to read from his book as part of the Pints And Prose Series co-sponsored by A Different Drummer Books and The Pepperwood Bistro. "When they were going out touring, it was way more rugged. We've been on the road for 10 years, but some of these guys had been doing it for, like, 20 years.

"There's characters for sure now, but it was the real deal back then."

The book is not an endless string of rock 'n' roll excess one-ups, although there are still quite a few. Aside from the obvious entertainment value, there's real insight to be gained into the clattery star-maker machinery on this side of the border and the States, highlighted by the passages documenting the Rheostatics' own disappointing experience with Seymour Stein and Sire Records.

And it's not often a reader can pick up a book and literally find themselves in it, as many of these stories and vignettes -- the chapters are labelled in provinces and regions, not numbers -- make mention of small venues and arenas in various parts of Canada.

Bidini and the Rheostatics, who will be in Hamilton for a soldout show at La Luna Saturday night, have never hidden their passion for all things Canadian, and Bidini's reverence for two national icons in particular -- hockey and Stompin' Tom Connors -- shine through in the book.

His original idea, in fact, was to make some kind of hockey book, but he's saved that for the next writing project.

"I had an idea to do sort of the oral history hockey -- which would be a huge book, maybe unwritable," says Bidini. "I actually did a proposal for that."

Taking a cue from Stompin' Tom, the Rheostatics have never been afraid to write about Canada, and even the lyrics and passages that don't mention actual places still drip maple. The book is the same way.

But Bidini was aware of the danger of feeling too nostalgic, and as a result On A Cold Road comes across first as a friendly powwow among musicians sharing a common experience primarily through the geography of their country and the lure of the land to the south.

"I think that people in general are reluctant to be romantic. Being romantic doesn't necessarily mean being nostalgic. I think that in terms of history it's important to acknowledge all of that exists, especially in musical culture," said Bidini.

And Hamilton is mentioned in fair abundance. Greg Godovitz, bassist for Fludd, later the frontman for Goddo, is a frequent voice in Bidini's book. He remembers a night in the city when, while contending with a fan trying to play guitar with his penis on stage, watching as another fan who had been using his head to smash beer bottles grabbed and buried a bottle into a third fan who had been mooning the band.

And for fans of The Red Green Show, there's an interesting passage quoting comedian Steve Smith and how he, as a member of the band Jason, was nudged away from music and into comedy by cold words from the manager of Deep Purple.

Bidini also took some time out Monday night to ponder the rickety state of live music in Hamilton, noting that his band has seldom played the same venue twice here over the years.

"It's tough, I know," said Bidini, "but you know what they should do? Set up a little stage in all of the Tim Hortons -- they're always packed! Doug Feaver would play them ... "