Gary Usher was one of the pioneers of surf music. Initially a songwriter for the Beach Boys', Usher soon graduated to putting together one-off studio bands to record under various pseudonyms revolving around the surf and hot rod genres. His first forays into the genre had been with a makeshift band called the Super Stocks (who had recorded three albums for Capitol), but by mid-1964, he had been recruited to assimilate failing instrumental bands into the vocal realm. The Surfaris, who had a hit in the summer of ’63 with ‘Wipe Out’, was one such group that was reordered to accommodate the growing demand.  According to Usher, it seems that following their surprise hit, the teenage band – all under 19 at the time – simply didn’t have the musical prowess to compete with the creative forces of Wilson and Berry. As a result, the Wrecking Crew was called in to supplement their playing on what would become their penultimate album, Hit City '65. Needless to say, the original members of the band were not so thrilled with being replaced by ‘ghost performers’. Primary guitarist Jim Pash recalled his frustration with the situation:

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      “…these guys [Gary Usher] just went in, put a microphone in front of us, and said, "Okay boys, play!" and if I could 

      not play up to the standards of what they considered to be good pop music, then they would bring in some ghost

      performers and record whatever they wanted to, using our name.”

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Usher later concurred, stating in the mid-80s that the group “never really had a say-so (sic) in the matter,” though he defended himself by maintaining that recruiting outside people was the only way he could “bring their product up to standard… otherwise it would have been a horrible disaster.”

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As a result of this new oversight, the material in Hit City '65 is noticeably different from the Surfaris' previous albums. It is a strange mishmash of various Surfaris originals contracted with slick, overproduced covers a' la the Wrecking Crew. 'Dance Dance Dance', 'My Little Bike', 'Black Denim', and 'My Buddy Seat' are all top-notch surf tracks, with Ron Wilson's distinct 'Surfer Joe'-vocal placed overtop of the Crew's excellent instruments and the Usher's usual team of vocalists. 'I'm Into Something Good', 'Leader of the Laundromat', 'Anyway You Want It', and 'Love Potion #9' are all passable 60s covers by the band/session musicians, and the remaining 'Gone Gone Gone', 'She's a Woman', and 'High Heeled Sneakers' are both sung and played by the Surfaris. 'Beat 65' is the lone instrumental on the album and directly resembles Duane Eddy's 'Moovin' and Groovin'.

 

Of course, the record-buying public had no idea what had been going on behind the scene, even Hit City’s jacket boasted a ‘quote’ from Usher praising the kids’ musicianship, almost humorously, for their “tremendous versatility and unique sound” going so far as to say that their “biggest asset [was] their ability to achieve their recording identity quickly on a session.” Many other surf groups, such as the Astronauts, the Go-Go's, and even surf music pioneer Dick Dale, would receive a similar fate. Hit City '65 has some highly polished moments - yet even with LA's top musicians, it still isn't able to recapture the raw energy that the local 5-piece band was able to instill into 'Wipe-Out'.​