Dick Dale

[davis]

I posted this vid on another music site I'm a member of and got some negative feedback on it. If anybody watches it here, please let me know what you think. I think it's really entertaining; anybody else think so?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVhK-9m6I3Y

[progholio]

it might not be his best performance but considering the man is in his 70's, had a pretty serious bout with cancer, is still among the living and touring today i say more power to him.

i got to see him a few years ago and those guys were every bit as potent as Motorhead, i think the man may have been the precursor to metal.
you've gotta love that his fans are referred to as 'dick-heads'

[davis]

it might not be his best performance but considering the man is in his 70's, had a pretty serious bout with cancer, is still among the living and touring today i say more power to him.

i got to see him a few years ago and those guys were every bit as potent as Motorhead, i think the man may have been the precursor to metal.
you've gotta love that his fans are referred to as 'dick-heads'

indeed, I count myself among the Dickheads. :lol IMO, being a cancer survivor and his age (72 at the time of that gig) make it even better; I could be wrong, but IMO people might mistake his spontaneity & eccentricities for this clip being a lousy performance. it beats the hell out of anything on AI. anyway, this is from his site/the short version:

"Leo Fender kept giving Dale amps and Dale kept blowing them up! Till one night Leo and his right hand man Freddy T. went down to the Rendezvous Ballroom on the Balboa Peninsula in Balboa, California and stood in the middle of Four Thousand screaming dancing Dick Dale fans and said to Freddy, I now know what Dick Dale is trying to tell me. Back to the drawing board. A special 85 watt output transformer was made that peaked 100 watts when dale would pump up the volume of his amp, this transformer would create the sounds along with Dale's style of playing, the kind of sounds that Dale dreamed of. BUT! they now needed a speaker that would handle the power and not burn up from the volume that would come from Dale's guitar.

Leo, Freddy and Dale went to the James B. Lansing speaker company, and they explained that they wanted a fifteen inch speaker built to their specifications. That speaker would soon be known as the 15'' JBL -D130 speaker. It made the complete package for Dale to play through and was named the Single Showman Amp. When Dale plugged his Fender Stratocaster guitar into the new Showman Amp and speaker cabinet, Dale became the first creature on earth to jump from the volume scale of a modest quiet guitar player on a scale of 4 to blasting up through the volume scale to TEN! That is when Dale became the "Father of Heavy Metal" as quoted from Guitar Player Magazine. Dale broke through the electronic barrier limitations of that era!"

[Garden Dreamer]

I have two of his 1990's albums that sound like nothing else out there - "surf shred?" The guy can really melt down an amp.

[tom unbound]

YEAH ! He was the man with the sound, wha.. STILL the man with the Sound ! PEOPLE DIDN'T LIKE THIS ? Looks like everyone's just having fun at the beach !! I don't think I've ever seen him play drums before ! D.Dale, D. Allen, Who else is 70 and still jamming ???

[davis]

... D.Dale, D. Allen, Who else is 70 and still jamming ???

Bob Dylan, except he don't play surf rock. If he would, I'd buy it.

[progholio]

on my way out the door in a few minutes to meet up with a couple of my Dick-head friends to go see Mr Dale, it will be awesome.

[davis]

We drove to Nashville, TN on 04/30 to see him play the Mercy Lounge. Great show. He does that stuff with the drumsticks toward the end of the show. the crowd I was part of loved it. I wanted to get a look at him up close, so we stuck around til he came out to the merch table to sign stuff. He walked through with a hand on somebody walking in front of him, as if he was being led there. I don't know if Dale's eyesight is going bad or what. that was strange. What was also strange was I had thought he was around 6-feet tall. Turns out he's my height (5'7"). So, we attended a Bob Dylan show on April 28 and Dick Dale on the 30th. When you've seen 2 living legends in the same week, what's next? just hanging out at home. :cool

[progholio]

awesome show last night, night and day difference between the video clip from the first post and the show I saw - this was the last stop on the tour, the band was super tight and Dick was on fire. I am absolutely convinced he is the godfather of shred guitar. the show was only 1hr 10 min but who cares, action packed from start to finish. the most badass 76 year old I've seen.


So, we attended a Bob Dylan show on April 28 and Dick Dale on the 30th.When you've seen 2 living legends in the same week, what's next? just hanging out at home. :cool


hanging at home sounds kinda good right now as i'm in a simlar boat - went to Bill Frisell last sunday (a legend in my book), Goat on weds (ok, no legend but mind blowing none the less), Dicko on thurs and going to Patti Smith on sunday, busiest week I've had in a while.

[roylayer]

I was at the same show (St. Louis) that Progholio wrote about. Wow! This was one of the best shows I've been to in a long while! He seems so "real," so natural. The guitar just seems like an extension of him... and he seems so happy to be performing. He sometimes changes songs mid-stream, and his poor bandmates (who are great!) have to pick up on the cue and follow him. He played a wide range of material - surf (of course), country, rockabilly, hard rock, and more. I can't say enough good things about this show.

He's going back on tour in the summer. Don't miss him!

[rcarlberg]

he seems so happy to be performing. He sometimes changes songs mid-stream, and his poor bandmates (who are great!) have to pick up on the cue and follow him. He looks like he's having fun in the video clip. More power (and long life!) to him.