Medical bills kept rock legend Dick Dale touring till the end

It was the mid-1960s and the rapid-fire sounds Dick Dale was pulling out of his gold-painted Fender Stratocaster had already reshaped popular music.

“I once made a million dollars a year with my career,” Dale reminisced to the Los Angeles Times magazine in 2001. “I made $10,000 for three minutes’ work on the ‘Ed Sullivan Show’ in 1963.”

But Dale’s time in the spotlight came to a sudden end in 1965. That year, when he was only 28, he was diagnosed with rectal cancer. As the Times magazine reported, doctors told the guitarist that without aggressive surgery, he could be dead in a matter of months.

Dale passed away on Saturday night,March 16, 2019. His longtime drummer Dusty Watson confirmed to NPR. The guitarist was 81. No cause of death has been released.

Tributes have begun popping up online, with many celebrating his distinctive sound. But the musician’s life story was also a constant struggle against health problems — and to pay medical bills. After his first cancer diagnosis in 1965, Dale continued to battle the disease. Up until the end of his life, Dale was explicit that he toured to fund his treatment.

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