Brian May of Queen and Jack White both wrote long tributes to late guitarist Dick Dale on Instagram.
White posted on theThird Man Records account, "I spent many moments learning his massive reverbed guitar licks in my bedroom, and still enjoy playing his song 'Nitro' whenever I can. Sadly, I never got to meet him. A unique innovator of the guitar with pick-melting style and swagger for miles. I can remember traveling up to Pontiac from Detroit by myself to watch him play when I was 16. That upside-down gold sparkle Fender of his needs to be hung up some place special."
May wrote that all guitarists "owe him" and credits the way Dale set up his instrument for making the surf-guitar legend one of a kind. "He’s left handed, but plays essentially a right handed guitar -- except for the controls and ‘horns.’ So his heavy bass-end strings are at the lower edge of the fretboard. This means his fingers could never fall in the same shapes as the rest of us. Maybe this led him to use those low notes more often and more forcefully than everyone around him."
Dale died at the age of 81 on Saturday.