Wipe Out - Hit Version / Extended Ending

"Wipe Out" is a popular instrumental track with a continuous surf rhythm. The only vocal is the occasional phrase "Wipe Out."

The Surfaris were a band of teenagers with less than enough pocket money to record their work. The group was actually composed of the following young artists: Jim Fuller (lead guitar), Robert Berryhill (rhythm guitar), Ron Wilson (drums), Jim Pash (saxophone) and Pat Connolly (bass). Pash, however, did not take part in the initial recording. The breakthrough belongs to Wilson, who did such an excellent job on the long drum solos that it became one of the most famous drum solo breaks played and recorded. Jim Pash told Dan Forte of Vintage Guitar magazine that "the format of 'Wipe Out' was inspired by Preston Epps' "Bongo Rock," as suggested by Bob Berryhill." In fact, Drummer Ron Wilson was the head drummer in the Charter High School Marching Band at the time and, according to Pash, "the 'Wipe Out' solo is actually a drum cadence they'd use to march the band onto the football field at halftime." Wilson would later set the world record for continuous drum soloing at 104 1/2 hours! He died of a brain aneurysm in 1989.

The group gathered money from their parents while scouting for a place to carry out their rehearsals and came across Dale Smallin. Owner of a small studio in Cucamonga, California, Smallin later became the Surfaris' manager. At Samllin's studio, they record a song called "Surfer Joe." When the engineer reminded the group that it takes two songs to make a single, the Surfaris recorded "Wipe Out," which they considered the throwaway B-side - they certainly didn't consider themselves an instrumental band. Smallin pressed 100 copies of the single, which are rare collector's items today and about 10 seconds longer than the commercially released version. He released the song on his DFS record label, and also allowed the Princess label to put out the song. One of the Princess copies made its way to Dot records, a major label which purchased the master tapes, edited off the 10 seconds at the end, and released the single with "Wipe Out" as the A-side and "Surfer Joe" as the flip. In this release, "Wipe Out" became a huge hit and a surf classic. "Surfer Joe" charted at #61 a few months later.