Al Burian is a multi-talented man who is always up for a challenge. He is constantly in a flux of one art project after another, from film (he played an acting role in the indie film Good Grief, a movie about a group of high school friends who mix up reality with a role-playing game called “Monsters and Mayhem,” a concept loosely resembling that ’80s Tom Hanks made-for-TV movie “Mazes and Monsters”) to music to writing. Most may know him for his membership in the hardcore synth-rock band Milemarker, but there is another project of his that has become an independent publishing phenomenon. That project is called Burn Collector, Burian’s zine of personal essays. You name it, he writes about it: the people he meets, how climate and geography affects his surroundings, and an obsession for painting astronauts?
“I spread out newspaper on the floor, in the spot most brightly illuminated by the street lights, lay down a scrap of wood, and begin working on an astronaut painting. I’m not sure what it is about the cosmonautical theme which has me so obsessed these days. Maybe it’s the year 2001, with all its Kubrikian implications, or maybe it’s the bulky, asphyxiating outfits I have to don to leave the house here in post-nuclear January of the new millennium, which, when combined with the ever-present over-filled backpack, does lend one an air of moon-wanderer, or the first person to reach Pluto, the first person to drive a flag into the frozen soil and then make a mad dash for the nearest coffee shop.”
Those are Burian’s words extracted from Burn Collector, number 12. Burn Collector is what Burian describes as a “strange object.” It remains as a depository for Burian’s personal writings, viewpoints, and perspectives on events and happenstance through the lens of his retinas. It is a way for him to exercise his demons, like a reality TV show without the television. The words that Burian writes glare at you, nakedly exposing him to those willing to read about his day-to-day life. And it’s not like Burian’s life is extravagant or wildly imaginative. It’s how Burian puts his thoughts down on paper that keeps us coming back for more.
“When I started, I never thought of myself as a writer,” he says. “I never went to school for it. It’s just something I’ve always done.”
Twelve issues and still going strong, how did Burian go from printing 30 copies of an issue he was mainly writing for his personal satisfaction to printing thousands for the world to see?
Rewind back to his college days, Burian went to school to study art and painting. Growing up in a musically inclined family — his mother, a classical viola player in an orchestra, and his dad, an opera buff with an extensive record collection — music has always played an important role in his life. It was at the premature age of 12 when he discovered punk culture. Little did he know that it would become his niche in life.
As the ’80s turned into the ’90s, he became more avidly involved in the punk scene, signing up to become a contributing columnist for Punk Planet. It was Punk Planet that opened him up to the world of zines and self-publishing, writing for various non-corporate publications like Heartattack and Clamor.
It was also his experience as an artist where he quickly developed a keen eye for design and space. Burn Collector became his experiment. “The idea of putting words into an object is fascinating. I’m obsessed with filling up specific sizes of paper with an exact number of words.”
Burian independently published his first issue in 1995, as a crudely photocopied piece of work he would smuggle out after his shift at a local copy shop. He would sell 30 issues at a time. Once those ran out, he would print more. As technology quickly advanced, and the zine’s popularity grew, each print run grew and the quality of the issues transformed into an elegant glossy design.
“It’s important, if you are writing, to go through the whole process. I try to make things that aren’t mediciny. There are ways of presenting things that are appealing and ways of presenting things that are off-putting.
“The zine is a way to express something about yourself. The world is so big, and you are this tiny person in it. It’s a way to have a conversation with 1,000 or so people you’ve never met before.”
It’s a daunting task to print personal thoughts on paper and make it comfortably appealing while making it interesting and intriguing to the reader. As one issue after another began to reach the public, Burian would always declare that each subsequent issue would be his last.
“Every time I finish one issue, I’m freaked out on the experience and don’t want to do another issue after that. It’s nerve-racking but after each issue is done and printed, I always end up wanting to do another one.”
Burian assures that Burn Collector will not fizzle out anytime soon. He is pondering the thought of interlocking each issue like an epic, relating his idea to the Star Wars saga where each issue will hold its own, but as a whole, it will act like an epic. To put things into perspective, Burn Collector is his yin, whereas Milemarker is his yang.
“Both the band and the zine work pretty well for me to concentrate on something that is visceral, emotive, and something else that is cerebral, intellectual. Milemarker is like a democratic institution, and Burn Collector is the remedy for my control-freak tendencies.”
To celebrate seven years of independent publishing, personal challenges, and human expression, The Buddy System has republished the first nine issues of Burn Collector in a single collector’s edition book.
This feature was originally written in 2010.
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