There was calm before the storm, like a stack of amps charged with electricity waiting for the first guitar note to be struck or, I imagine, just like the feeling moments before a monster wave crashes down on an adrenaline high surfer.



Guitar god Dick Dale was gathering his thoughts. It didn’t take him long. After a moment or two of awkward silence, upon reaching him by phone in his hotel room — out on tour for the umpteen billionth time — the deluge came.



It was a deluge of stories, a deluge of anecdotes, a deluge of self-confidence, and — most importantly — a deluge of insight from the 72-year-old icon, the man who created surf guitar, reinvented the word loud, and stands alone in the realm of rock history — an original in a world of contemporaries.



There is only one Dick Dale, and if you ever have the chance to talk to him he’ll be more than happy to share this with you — his voice booming and in charge, original Boston roots mixing with the California surf vernacular that he’s helped define.



“Pain or romance. That’s what I do with the guitar. I don’t do scales. I either make it sound like it’s in pain or in love,” says Dale of his guitar playing style — a left-handed, upside-down, reverb-drenched decibel assault like no other in the storied history of rock.

“Satriani would vomit if he saw me play.”



Perhaps he would, but if Satriani did lose his lunch over Dale’s unconventional wailing, it wouldn’t faze Dick Dale. Along with plenty of self-confidence, Dale is the kind of creature dead set on tackling life on his own terms, his own way. It’s this drive that explains how he was able to create a sound and playing style in the early ’60s that required equipment that didn’t even exist yet — beefed up amps and guitars that were eventually specially designed by Leo Fender for Dale’s madness.



“Like Albert Einstein split the atom,” says Dale, in regard to the newfangled, chunkier amps that he helped create in order to perfect his signature sound, “Dick Dale split the world of electronics.”



“Music is sensual,” he continues, answering a question he posed to himself about why people are drawn to his music. “It’s because I’m playing to their inner feelings, their sexuality, their emotions.”



Dale’s drive to tackle life also explains how he’s been able to go toe-to-toe with cancer, not once but twice. Forty years ago he was diagnosed with rectal cancer and told he had three months to live. After undergoing a fairly brutal surgery, the cancer went into remission — only to return two years ago.



But while that cancer may have caused Dale to take two years off from touring, it should come as no surprise that the King of Surf Guitar, having once again battled cancer into remission through radiation treatment and chemotherapy, is back out on the road and taking no prisoners.



“My body doesn’t work exactly like it’s supposed to all the time, but I don’t give a crap what cancer says. Here I am,” says Dale. “The people are my medicine.”



Dale will plug in at Hell’s Kitchen in Tacoma this Saturday with Tacoma’s beloved Girl Trouble and Forever Came Calling, or FCC — a band of whippersnappers that includes Dale’s son, Jimmy, on drums.  While Dale will no doubt enjoy the appreciative Hell’s Kitchen crowd, especially when he rips into “Miserlou” — his trademark 1962 classic that many now associate with Pulp Fiction — it seems these days Dale’s greatest thrill comes from simply living life and helping his son find his way in the music business, even if Jimmy Dale doesn’t always appreciate it.



“Like I’m the king of surf guitar, Jimmy is the king of feet,” says Dale, referencing his son’s kick drum speed. “He does things on drums I’ve never dreamed of. He hates it when I call him the king of feet. 



“He says other people are faster. I just tell him it doesn’t mean you’re faster than anybody; it just means you’re goddamn fast. It gives people something to write about.

“It’s like painting a picture. It’s all about what funny bone you move in people,” Dale continues.



“It’s fun to paint pictures.”



Dale should know. He’s made a career out of painting such pictures, and it’s a stunning sight.



[Hell’s Kitchen, with Forever Came Calling, Girl Trouble, Saturday, June 27, 9 p.m., $20, 3829 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253.759.6003]