Anthony Gibson – songwriter,
producer, stage manager and manager of the new sensation Niki Darling along with DJ Ryan Sky – is impassioned by the opportunity to create. A prominent figure in New York gay nightlife, he has worked with fashion designers, DJs and “Get Out! Magazine’s” host at the awards and holiday parties, Sir Honey Davenport.
How did you meet Niki Darling?
I actually met Niki through a mutual friend of ours. He was bartending at Candle Bar on the Upper West Side, and I had done a playlist of music while he was working, and Niki came up to me and said, “I heard you did this playlist, and I really love your taste in music.” It just started from there, and we connected musically.
Do you actually manage Niki?
It’s a great thing we have, because we’ve been friends going on seven years now. I do manage her day-to-day and gigs, but it’s also a great friendship at same time.
And how did you meet Ryan Skyy?
I was styling Taryn Manning at the time, and a designer by the name of Deryck Todd that I pulled from hit me up and said he knew this artist that was looking for someone to do art direction for a project. So he gave me a call. From talking on the phone we realized that we both were from Pennsylvania—actually a very rural part of Pennsylvania. That was really crazy, because I’m from a really small town in the middle of nowhere, and it turned out that we grew up like 30 minutes from each other. So I started to do art direction/styling for some promotional photos, and from working together we had a huge connection with music. Then we started to write together. I brought Niki into the mix, and it all kinda blossomed from there.
What exactly is it that you do?
It’s a difficult question for me to answer. I love to create. I moved to New York as a performer, a dancer and an actor. I did that whole route for a few years. Then I got an opportunity to assist a fashion designer by the name of Zaldy. I didn’t study fashion. I didn’t know anything about it. I started out doing really mundane chores like picking things up and dropping things off, but being around all that creativity really inspired me and opened me up to a whole new world. The cool thing was that the majority of his projects at the time were music based. So it was this great connect between the visual and the music and the performance, which inspired me to combine all the knowledge I had gained both on stage and behind the scenes and produce my own stuff. I guess I’m a producer or creative director? I don’t really know what title to put on it.
All of those sound good. Now Anthony, if you were a porn star, what would your name be?
There’s that thing where you take the name from your first pet and the street that you grew up on. Going off of that, my name would be Duke Dicksonburg.
If you were a superhero, what powers would you want?
That’s a good one. I think having the ability to control time would be awesome, so I could slow down the good moments and speed up the bad!
Name your least favorite thing about humanity?
I would have to say for me it’s the lack of acknowledgment and empathy for each other. Everyone is so into their phones, social media, posting and getting “liked.” I feel like personal interaction has been lost. I really wish people would put down their phones from time to time and experience life first hand and not through Facebook feeds or Instagram photos.
Photo By Wilsonmodels
