Misirlou

“Misirlou” is a folk song from the Eastern Mediterranean region, with origins in the Ottoman Empire. The original author of the song is not known, but Arabic, Greek and Jewish musicians were playing it by the 1920’s. In 1962, Dick Dale rearranged the song as a solo instrumental rock guitar piece. During a performance, Dale was bet by a young fan that he could not play a song on only one string of his guitar. Dale’s father and uncles were Lebanese-American musicians, and Dale remembered seeing his uncle play “Misirlou” on one string of the oud. He vastly increased the song’s tempo to make it into rock & roll. And so, it was Dale’s surf rock version that introduced “Misirlou” to a wider audience. The Beach Boys recorded a similar version for the 1963 album “Surfin’ USA”, solidifying “Misirlou” as a staple of American pop culture.

In 1994 Quentin Tarantino famously used it as the opening song for “Pulp Fiction”, one of the most critically acclaimed movies of all time. Not only Dale’s career was rebooted after this, the instrumental surf rock genre also was very popular again.

This is an original CD single from 1994 in amazing shape, released for promotion of the film soundtrack.