Danny Tenaglia: “DJs making $200,000 more a gig than me. I'm not bitter about it, I get a kick out of it”

In a recent interview with Billboard, New York club stalwart Danny Tenaglia made it quite clear that he is unfazed by the wave of fast-rising superstar DJs who seem to appear as if from nowhere in the industry he has been at the heart of for four decades.

In discussing how happy he was to be playing at Marco Carola’s revered Music On party in Brooklyn’s Depot 52 warehouse on 16th he told Billboard that, though he had never played with the Italian techno don before, it was “nice to see somebody who's paid their dues, not somebody who it's like, who was that two years ago?”

Having been aware of Carola’s output and calibre for years, he seemed delighted that he was sharing a bill with someone who’d been in the game for decades and not someone who turns up and plays with “one hand on the knob, one hand in the air, oh, I'm a DJ too. You know, the DJ's making $200,000 more a gig than me.”

“I'm not bitter about it, I get a kick out of it,” he added. “Because I'm still glad that it's related to what I do, it's music, it's entertainment. It's changed 100% [from] when I started at clubs and lounges in Brooklyn 40 years ago. But I'm still in it. I can't complain. I could, but I won't.”

In that same interview Tenaglia discussed the changing scene in New York and his sadness at the rapid pace in which clubs are closing.

Tenaglia's influence, particularly in the New York club circuit, stretches far and wide. Have a read of our 10 moments that defined Danny Tenaglia here.