Laptop DJ battles are about as lame as the cruddy DJs and producers who took part in them to begin with. A more riveting branch of competitive events can be found in Hair Wars, David “Hump Grinder” Humphries’ 20-year-old, multi-city competition that pits one outrageous hairstyle against another, now documented in a photography book of the same name by David Yellen.

Complete with images of an eight-foot-wide mohawk, some dude with a dreaded beard that hangs lower than his knees, a pimp-esque brother with what appears to be an ostrich-feather coat holding a blow-dryer like a pistol, and many more bizarre styles, Yellen’s photographs capture the Hair Wars events in all of their freakish grandeur. An introduction and interviews from fashion writer Johanna Lenander (i-D, New York Magazine) makes Hair Wars as a legitimate historical look at one of the most profound battles around–at least when compared to laptop DJs.

is available in November 2007 from powerHouse Books.