Hasta La Ideas

From Barry McGee to Save Tibet, DJ DB’s thousands of stickers in his new book

Founder of the record label Breakbeat Science and an early proponent of drum and bass, DB Burkeman (known to most as producer, promoter and DJ DB) wears many hats. Most recently, he took up the role of editor with his book “Stickers: Stuck-Up Piece of Crap: From Punk Rock to Contemporary Art.”

Created with downtown girl-in-the-know Monica LoCascio, “Stickers” proudly displays Burkeman’s collection—a mass he’s accumulated over the past 30 years—as well as essays from Shepard Fairey, Bill McMullen, JK5, Stanley Donwood, HAZE, Moby, Lance Mountain and collections from several other prominent sticker collectors and makers such as Kaws, Espo and Invader.

The encyclopedic document covers a wide swathe of contemporary culture where stickers have been involved. With 4,000 examples, stickers span the Velvet Underground’s Warhol banana sticker album cover to DIY postal stickers gracing NYC street lights.

Compiled according to genre, Stickers begins with punk rock and hardcore, goes on to skateboarding, early hip-hop, political messages and graffiti tags. Pages of actual stickers designed by Maya Hayuk, Ryan McGinness, Aiko, Todd James, Surface to Air, Barry McGee, KR and more allow you to get in on the action. DB says, “After three years of insane work and 6000 stickers all over our house, my family’s feeling about the book finally coming out is “Thank F*%&!”

“Stickers” sells from Amazon.