I feel that my experiences in reacting to the postmemory of the Wild Ones are quite unique. Ever since I was very young, I knew that my father had played in a notable (if not very famous) rock 'n roll group in the 1960s. Now that I have conducted extensive research on the band, the period in which they had gained their notoriety, and some of the notable venues in which they played, among other topics, I feel much more in tune with my postmemory, I feel like I can relate better with ther experiences my father had.

I found a great deal of challenge in conducting research for my project. Instead of reviewing articles or edited books on my topic, I found myself digging through a box of poorly organized newspaper clippings, photographs, negatives, magazines, magazine clippings, letters, memos, and the like. Many letters lacked a clear author, adressee, or date, some photographs lacked a title or date, and there was much material (a large collection of clippings mentioning Sybil Burton and Jordan Christopher, for example) that was irrelevant to the band that had to be filtered through. I welcomed this challenge, mostly as a result of my excitement about having such a wealth of great resources at my disposal. I also have an interest in music history, and I am excited about the opportunity to try for myself what music historians do.

Of course, in addition to reviewing all of the materials I have presented here, I have taken the time to listen to all of the band's recordings. As I'm writing this I am listening to the b-side of the "Wild Thing" single, "I'm All Cried Out (Just Can't Cry Anymore)". I was very, very pleased to find the original demo recording of Chip Taylor singing "Wild Thing" in my father's personal collection of demos and 45s relating to the Wild Ones, a very valuable piece of rock 'n roll memorabilia (to collectors, not just myself). This allowed me to gain a most unique perspective into the final arrangement the Wild Ones recorded of this song.

There is much material that I discovered during the course of my research that I did not deem "historically significant" but are still of interest in terms of my postmemory of the group. It is mostly stories from recollections on the part of my father and Chuck Alden about experiences the band had while touring and performing.

This project is far from complete. I consider this project to be an abstract of the story of the Wild Ones, an introduction to the band's experiences. The band's biography would consist of a document that precipitates at least ten times the research one can presume I conducted for the project and ten times the documentation I have collected for this project. I would like to pursue a study of the group which would be far more in-depth than what the viewer can view here at a future time.