Just read on Yahoo! that The Mouth, Morton Downey Jr., has passed on. Lung cancer, doncha know.
I’m not here to excoriate the man, since I hadn’t formed any serious political opinions when his show was on. But this line caught my eye:
Say it ain’t so, Joe! Not that I go out of my way to listen to “Wipe Out”, but now every time I hear it I’m gonna connect it with that doofus. Anyone able to point me to resources that might indicate whether this is true or not?
(NB: I realize this may be a GQ kind of thread, but it just didn’t seem like one to me.)
What a shame. Remember, Morton, always to the right, never to the left. But I’ve got a feeling there aren’t many mirrors where you’re going, anyway.
I didn’t find much about Morton’s songwriting career, but I did find this unanswered question through a Google search:
“I own a copy of Wipe Out by the Lively Ones which in my opinion complely blows away the Surfaris version. Anyway, on the British CD (Music Club label), the song is credited to (Frankhauser) Frankhauser Merrell Wayne. That would be ok, however, on the Rhino Surfin’ Hits CD the credits for the Surfaris version goes to Berryhill, Connolly, Fuller & Wilson. Both versions are almost the same, except the Lively Ones version leaves out the final bridge before the closing chords, and it is about twice as fast as the Surfaris version. Since Berryhill, etc were members of the Safaris, I would imagine those credits are correct. So who is Frankhauser??? This may have something to do with the Del Fi label, who originally released the Lively Ones disc. Even if they recorded an abridged version, shouldn’t the writing credits still go to Berryhill, etc?”
I know this merely complicates the question, but perhaps someone who knows better will come along.