The members of Madison, Wisc.’s The Moon Gypsies are no strangers to music. All four have lived into or around middle age with the art as a driving force for much of their lives.It’s Tuesday, early evening, and Chris Wagoner sits in his Cedar Falls hotel room chatting on the phone before heading out to The Cellar, a local bar, to do a show. The night before, the Gypsies had appeared on KUNI’s “Live from Studio One.” Wagoner says the show went well and a large studio audience had shown up.One of the Gypsies’ strengths seems to be their ability to adapt to the surrounding environment. While on KUNI, the band had performed a primarily acoustic set.”Sometimes we do folkier shows and sometimes we do rockier shows,” he says. It all depends on the circumstances. However, Wagoner promises that Friday’s show at the M-Shop will be more on the rockier side.The Moon Gypsies, an Americana-folk-rock group, have only been together for a little over two years but sound and act as though they’ve been playing together much longer.”The band is kind of a family,” Wagoner says. “It can be volatile some times because we have a bunch of creative people.” Yet Wagoner says they are good at working out their problems. “Some bands don’t do that well. It’s not an easy process.”The Gypsies may not be a household name yet, but they have had their first few tastes of success. Numerous critics have showered the band and their self-titled debut with praise.One song, “A Million Miles Away,” written by Robert J. Conaway, guitar and primary song writer, received first place in Billboard’s 1999 Songwriting contest in the R&B/Blues category. The song is currently being played on 26 radio stations across the nation. Just one of the perks of winning this contest was a chance to have the song picked up by a major music artist. “The Billboard award is sort of an acknowledgment that we’re doing OK,” Wagoner says, even though the song wasn’t picked up by any major artists.The irony of it all is that Conaway had actually written “A Million Miles Away” with the hope that blues star Bonnie Raitt would sing it.”The song got as far as Bonnie Raitt’s desk, but wasn’t selected among the thousands of other songs that have been sent to her. You stand a better chance of getting it in their hands” than having them actually select it. The politics of it are totally circumstantial,” Wagoner adds.As it turns out, Conaway has been submitting songs to an agency which places songs in movie soundtracks, in the hopes of expanding awareness of the band.”He’s actually been doing that for quite a while, but it’s a vicious market,” Wagoner says.Still, there has been some success in this area as well. The Moon Gypsies’ song, “Other People Say,” appears on Tom Green’s latest video release “Uncensored.” While the foursome are happy to be getting the exposure, Wagoner expressed some reservation about the song being on Green’s video.”To get your foot in the door,” he said, “you have to [bite the bullet] sometimes. And then at some point you can be kind of more picky.”Since the band’s conception, the Gypsies have toured with the likes of Ray Charles, Taj Mahal and Willy Porter, to name a few, and they have performed at such venues as Chicago’s House of Blues, Milwaukee’s Summerfest and Denver’s The Taste of Colorado.While involved with other bands, members of the Gypsies have shared stages with such groups as the Beach Boys, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, The Nylons and The Band. Mary Gaines, guitar and vocals, has even recorded with more current acts such as U2 and The Smashing Pumpkins.All of this, from the members’ affiliation with international rock groups to their adaptive and innovative sound, has helped to expand the Gypsies’ ever-growing fan base.Currently, the band is working on a follow-up album which they hope to have finished by late spring. Meanwhile, the band plays Friday at M-Shop.