The Beach Boys had long quit their surfin' safari sound for more universal themes when vocalist Mike Love was claimed by a couple of old board-riding buddies to go for a surf.
Next day, or so the story goes, Love drove around to bandmate and cousin Brian Wilson's place to share the stoke born of that belated surf session. They sat down together to thrash out one last surfing song - a nostalgia-laden homage to hormones and hangin' out. Do It Again says it all.
Meanwhile, across the Pacific, Merewether Surfboard Club (MSC) was barely out of infancy. Ratified at a 1964 meeting of mates in a Frederick Street front yard, longevity was never on the agenda. And yet, all these years and waves later, MSC is now contemplating a 60th summer.
It was an embryonic era for surfing's pioneering clubs. Kirra (1962) and Phillip Island (1963) were already up and riding when Merewether, Maroubra and North Narrabeen launched within months of each other. Others would soon follow. This year marks Catherine Hill Bay's 50th .
For that cohort, six decades on, the Beach Boys' sun-laced lyrics ring as redolent as ever.
"Well, I've been thinkin' 'bout all the places we've surfed and danced / And all the faces we've missed / So, let's get back together and do it again."
That yearning for salt-flecked days of fun, sun, chasing waves and wild ways will never quit. From old farts to the freshly minted, the Merewether crew and well-wishers from the Hunter surfing community will frock up for a 60th birthday ball and reunion at City Hall on November 16.
They're getting back together to do it again. The timing is sweet: for MSC's ancient founders, this may be the last dance.
Through three generations, their club has carved quite a history, pulled quite a community in its wake, and, right now, is enjoying record membership, due in no small part to the rising tide of females, inspired by Philippa Anderson, shaking up the culture.
If you're not familiar with the MSC tale, it's worth a visit to the Beach Hotel to scan the honour boards, trophy cabinet and photo collection. They plot the path of world championships, Bells Beach titles, national team trophies and the parade of stars to graduate from the local reef breaks to surfing's world tour.
That done, you can wander across Frederick Street to Jefferson Park and find the steel plaque denoting the spot on which the club was founded on June 27, 1964.
If history depicts Merewether as a contest powerhouse, it's a surprise to hear the club's most decorated surfer posing a different narrative: it ain't all about winning.
"For the past 60, years," offers four-time world champion Mark 'MR' Richards, "It's not been about someone who has done well in a contest. The real story is the passion shown in doing the hard yards of organising events, managing teams, running the show. Since day one, there has always been someone who has stepped up and made it happen."
The club's competitive edge, MR suggests, is the end product of those quiet contributors.
To mark the anniversary, the originals of '64 returned for a founders' day celebration and the laying of the tablet. Noel Jackson was there.
In May '64 Jacko and a dozen or so mates had travelled to Manly to witness Midget Farrelly winning the world championship.
"Around the same time, a club - it might have been Windansea - came up to compete at Nobbys," he says.
"It looked very well organised. Those two events put the seed in our minds to form our own club.
"I was 17 at the time and studying accountancy, so they made me treasurer."
From the outset, familial ties provided handy guard-rails. Surf shop owner (and Mark's dad) Ray Richards offered backing and oversight of bright ideas like hiring cinemas to show surf movies.
"We made a heap of dough and ploughed it back into the club," Noel Jackson, a life member, recalls.
"We staged events, entered our members and teams into contests and were very successful. I'm proud to say that we still are."
A 2291 postcode wasn't a prerequisite for membership. Surfers drifted in from elsewhere. Marcus Brabant travelled from Port Macquarie en route to becoming 1990 world junior champion and a tour professional. Stockton-raised Greg Antcliff was surfing for Northside but kept running into the Merewether crew at 1980s contests.
"I got to know a lot of them and enjoyed the camaraderie," he says.
He joined in '86, "copped a bit of stick from my Stocko mates but it was all good fun".
Sixty years after he joined as a 16-year-old, Warren Thwaites wonders at MSC's dynastic reputation: not so much a few family trees, more a forest.
"I love seeing the different generations - husbands, wives and their kids - competing. That's what it's all about."
It's all a bit different to the wild, testosterone-fuelled days of the club's adolescence.
As a Merewether teenager, Warren met a 14 year-old blonde-haired girl called Marilyn, who would hang out with her friends at the beach. Fifty-five years later, they're still married. Their daughter Brooke Stephenson marked founders' day by producing a stylishly rendered short film showcasing the club's pioneers.
These days, the survivors of the surfin' '60s are going to more funerals than 21sts.
The rueful mantra at a beachside wake last month was: "We've got to find another reason for getting together."
MSC life member Mick Kiely played at that wake and will be back behind his drum kit at the November ball. He'll share the stage with clubmates Paul "Corky" Carroll, Terry Caban and Will Grahame, backing Gina Caban's vocals. Also on the bill, local next-generation Oz garage '60s surf punkers Splodge. They'll be joined by Sydney rock/pop thrillers and dance-floor fillers The White Tree Band.
Mick drew his percussive urge from MSC hall-of-famer Peter Cornish.
"I used to sneak into the Beach Hotel under-aged to catch Peter in a band called Earthwood," he says.
"He tuned my first-ever drum kit. The Gretsch kit I'm still playing today was once his."
What's it with surfing and music? Mick shrugs before running off the names of a dozen or so locals capable at both.
"So many guys from the beach can surf and play."
His surfing epiphany came when he caught a glimpse of MR tearing up Merewether's Third Reef.
"I went down to Ray Richards' surf shop and joined the club. As a receipt, he gave me this blue decal with the club's name on it. I've still got it."
Cal Horton and Ryan Callinan are former classmates and sons of life members. Cal is the club president and Ryan a star of the world tour.
Cal reckons next month's bash will be much more than another MSC party.
"It will be a celebration of surfing in Newcastle and the ability of beach culture to draw people together and have fun; a testament to the coastal lifestyle that makes this town so special; an occasion for everyone to catch up and remember the good times and friends past and present," he says.
(Footnote: The Beach Boys are currently touring, November 16, they play in Ontario, Canada. Opening song on the set-list? Do It Again.)
