A biography for Dick Dalehasn’t been written yet.
“I like to say, 'I hit every type of music in a show, and I play the people, not the instruments.'”
“With every problem comes a gift in hand.”
“There's a saying. If you want someone to love you forever, buy a dog, feed it and keep it around.”
“When I start playing I'm just a rollercoaster of sound. I don't know what's coming next, I never do, and I sit and sign and talk to the people afterwards.”
“When my guitar was growling, playing surf beat, you could hear it; you could feel it.”
“I used to surf up in Ventura County at Silver Strand; plus, I've played up there many times.”
“I actually first picked up an ukulele before I picked up a guitar.”
“You know, music is sex. It's a sensual driving mode that affects people if it's played a certain way.”
“Every time I do an album, I say, 'That's the last one.'”
“I grew a love for helpless, defenseless things. People would give me lions and jaguars. I had cheetahs, monkeys.”
“Gene Krupa was my big hero, and I used to play on my mother's flour cans and sugar cans with the kitchen knives, listening to the big bands on my dad's records. Gene Krupa and Harry James.”
“I used to be a mean maniac. Someone once threw a firecracker at a show and I jumped off the side of the stage and whacked 'em on the side of the head.”
“Music is nothing but a door opener to meet families and their children and the elderly.”
“I don't live with the 'right' people. I don't want to. I don't want to live with the rich in Beverly Hills or walk the streets of Hollywood. I want to go to K-mart and get good deals.”
“I have all the rhythm in my left hand, and I use the rhythms that Gene Krupa did on his drums.”
“The kids called me King of the Surf Guitar. I surfed sunup to sundown.”
“I always felt people should live with animals.”
“I'm constantly being influenced by the soul that's directly in front of me.”
“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.”
“I'm going to make people happy. I'm going to make them forget about their cancer. I'm going to make them forget about their diabetes.”