John Maher - A Teenage Buzzcock in New York (1979-1980)
11th March – 20th April 2025
Gallery 103, Trongate 103, Glasgow
Open Monday - Sunday 10am till 5.30pm
I was nineteen in 1979. I was about to spend three weeks travelling across America with Buzzcocks – our first US tour. Talk about excitement! None of us had been to America before. I needed a camera. At this stage of my photographic career, I didn’t know the difference between an f-stop and a lens cap, so my first camera had to be easy to use… point and shoot.
If you were around at the time, you can’t fail to have escaped the barrage of TV adverts featuring David Bailey promoting the Olympus Trip 35. I believed the hype and handed over my money. Looking back at the results more than four decades on, I’ve got to say that little Olympus Trip did a great job. Fifty quid well spent!
Between August 1979 and November 1980 we toured the US three times. So did my Olympus Trip. I took around 200 shots in all. It never occurred to me to take lots of band pics. I took a few, but I was more interested in photographing AMERICA! Most are street scenes, buildings, views from the back seat of the van, hotel interiors and lots of 1950s American cars. - John Maher
This exhibition was produced by Street Level Photoworks and exhibited at Mono in June 2024, on the occasion of the launch of the book ‘Sixteen Again: a celebration of Buzzcocks, Pete Shelley and Manchester music’ by Paul Hanley (available from Monorail Music)
John Maher is from Manchester, England. He got a second-hand drum kit for his 16th birthday. Five weeks later, an hour before heading back to school to sit his Chemistry O Level, John was invited to join Buzzcocks. The band went on to have several chart hits. ‘Ever Fallen in Love’, reached No.12 in the UK charts. The band broke up in 1981.
Following the split, John spent the next couple of years touring and recording with a number of artists before turning his attention to another of his interests: high performance air-cooled Volkswagens, teaching himself the skills required to machine, modify and assemble high power race engines. He built and raced two drag cars between 1988 and 1992. Volksworld magazine, declared John’s first race car, Mr Beetle, one of the ‘Cars that Shaped the Scene’.
In 2002, John relocated from his home town of Manchester to the Isle of Harris, where he lives and works today. He says it took him seven years to discover a way of photographing the islands in a style that interested him. John created a new way of interpreting the Hebridean landscape, with a refreshing and innovative series of long exposure photographs – all shot during the dead of night, under the light of a full moon. John’s unique photographic style and creative use of additional light quickly gained a following in the Outer Hebrides and beyond. His photographs of decaying man-made objects set against a backdrop of stunning Hebridean landscapes have been published in national newspapers, photography magazines and numerous online articles. John has also appeared in several UK and European television documentaries, discussing his photographs and the stories behind them.
Although John’s chosen career paths may seem eclectically diverse (music, engineering and photography), they all have one thing in common – he’s completely self-taught. Check John's website here
This exhibition was produced by Street Level and exhibited at Mono in June 2024, on the occasion of the launch of the book ‘Sixteen Again: a celebration of Buzzcocks, Pete Shelley and Manchester music’ by Paul Hanley. ‘Sixteen Again’ is available from Monorail music in Kings Court.
Banner Image: NY Ukrainian Liberation Front Corner of St Mark's Place and 2nd Avenue © John MaherLeft Image: Pete Shelley, San Francisco Airport (1979) © John Maher
