My philosophy is that on a scale of 1 to 10, I will go to 15. No matter what!
I thought of Gene Krupa's drumming, his staccato drumming. I went and put 'Misirlou' to that rhythm.
I don't claim to be a musician, I didn't go to Julliard.
My music is more native than intricate or technical.
When I come onstage, I'm exploding.
Dick Dale don't surf no more.
I may play the same songs night to night, but I never play them the same way.
People just loved the sound because I kept it simple.
I don't like to use the word 'fans;' I call them 'Dick Dale music lovers.'
If you ask me what I'd rather be doing, well, I'd rather be home in California, watching TV, polishing my tools and working around the ranch.
When I played with Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings in Vegas, the guys used to go, 'Dick, cut it out, man! You're moving around too much on this stage. You're making us look bad!'
Surfers were the ones who named all my songs. They'd yell out the names, and we just kept 'em.
My uncle gave me a trumpet, but I loved the Louis Armstrong sound and the Harry James sound and I played by ear and I played always soulful or very direct from the gut.
My aunt played the piano and I used to sit and listen to it.
I like to say, 'I hit every type of music in a show, and I play the people, not the instruments.'
People who have witnessed all the years of me playing, they bring their kids and say, 'I used to see this guy when I was fourteen!'
I actually first picked up an ukulele before I picked up a guitar.
I grew a love for helpless, defenseless things. People would give me lions and jaguars. I had cheetahs, monkeys.
I always felt people should live with animals.
My philosophy is the thicker the wood the thicker the sound, the bigger the string the bigger the sound. My smallest string is a 14 gauge.
Whatever you do, don't take shortcuts. It's great advice to take and live by.
You shouldn't even be writing this story if you haven't heard me play live. You can't write with the passion you receive until you see a Dick Dale concert.
I've never taken a lesson in my life, and I can play every instrument there is. I play by ear, but I can fool anybody into thinking I went to some conservatory of music.
Guitar Player Magazine says Dick Dale is the father of Heavy Metal, blowing up 48 amplifiers, creating the first power amplifier.
I don't play pyrotechnic scales. I play about frustration, patience, anger. Music is an extension of my soul.
The ultimate guitar players can play every scale in the book.
I always wanted a guitar. I always wanted to be a cowboy singer because I also listened to Hank Williams, and he would always sing these neat romantic songs.
I almost had to have my leg amputated because of an infection.
I do not play to musicians. I play to the people.
Surf music is played through a Showman amp with a Stratocaster guitar.
What I play now isn't surf music. It's too powerful. I used to go through paper bags; now I go through brick walls. I play hard.
I blew amps like they were made of tissue paper. Once I blew out the sound system at Royal Albert Hall in London.
Buddy Rich was one of the most incredible technicians in the world, on this planet, but the only people he could really impress, who knew what he was doing was another musician or another drummer.
The Musicians Hall of Fame is chosen by thousands of your peers. So it's the real thing.
I can play every instrument there is, every horn, I've played all the saxes and trumpets and everything and keyboards.
Kids don't see me as an oldies person when I go out on stage. They see me as an energy force.
When I started surfing, you'd hear this neat rumbling sound when you took off and go for the drop, and when the wave is lipping up over the top of you, it makes this hissing sound.
Some guys record an album with songs that are filler. I recorded this album like it was my last.
I told them if were going to do it were going to do it right, I'm not leaving 'til it's done. My wife, child and I slept in the studio. We cut these raw.
I enjoy living like a hermit, but I cannot live like a hermit.
There's a saying. If you want someone to love you forever, buy a dog, feed it and keep it around.
I learned everything by ear and played all the different instruments. So then I was able to find a guitar. That was, like, in the seventh grade. And then I didn't know how to put my fingers on all the different strings, so I had to figure out how to do it upside down and backwards, and I still play that way today.
I was reading a magazine when I was a little kid, probably about twelve years old, and an ad said that if you sell so many jars of Noxzema skin cream, we'll sell you a ukulele. So I went out and banged on doors in the snow in Quincy, Massachusetts, where I was raised, and I sold the skin cream.
I know what it's like to wash my clothes in a Chevron station.
I used to surf up in Ventura County at Silver Strand; plus, I've played up there many times.
I'm dedicated to touring the rest of my life.
I've never followed a list in my life, and that's probably what has created so much nervous energy in my body.
In the Shao Lin temple, they never allow you to touch the skin of a drum until you can tongue what you're going to play.
Earthlings are confused, insecure. And some Earthlings have no heritage: that's what leads them to kill each other and rob 7-11 stores.
