Joe Stevens
Joe Stevens
Joe Stevens (born July 25, 1938) is an American photographer from New York City. He specialized in photographing 1970s and 1980s rock musicians and bands, notably David Bowie, the Sex Pistols, and The Clash. Early in his career, Stevens worked as a coffee house manager in the city and took publicity photos of musicians performing at the Playhouse Cafe. He was encouraged to pursue photography as a career by rock photographer Jim Marshall. Stevens did not have any formal training in photography and served for a time as road manager for Miriam Makeba and The Lovin' Spoonful. He encountered Jim Marshall again at the 1969 Woodstock festival and realized he "had an eye" for photography.Moving to England in the early 1970s, he was identified in the International Times by the photo credit "Captain Snaps" because he did not have a work permit. This became a nickname. One of his first employers was Paul McCartney, who hired him to photograph Wings on its first European tour on the recommendation of his wife Linda McCartney. Stevens later worked several years for the New Musical Express before returning to New York City, where he photographed the scene around CBGB, including Debbie Harry and the Ramones. A number of his images are considered iconic. One is of Paul McCartney hiding in the arms of his wife during the couple's arrest for marijuana possession on Aug. 10, 1972 after a Wings concert in Gothenburg, Sweden. Others are of John Lennon wearing plastic bags on his hands as he and Yoko Ono join marchers protesting the 1971 obscenity trial of the editors of Oz magazine; Peter Gabriel covered with soap bubbles circa 1974 in the bathtub of Stevens's flat on Finborough Road in London S.W. 10; and the 1976 fight between members of the Sex Pistols and their audience at London's Nashville Rooms. The Gabriel image was one of a number of New Musical Express cover photos by Stevens. In January 1978, Stevens photographed the Sex Pistols on their only American tour. When the group broke up in San Francisco, Stevens helped lead singer Johnny Rotten (John Lydon) fly to New York City, where Rotten stayed in the photographer's New York apartment before returning to London.In 2011, Stevens told an entertainment publication that he sees himself as a chronicler of history. In 2015, Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth said that Stevens "was really the bridge between New York and London... He was really significant in the whole history that was developing in new music at that time."