Psychedelic, folk, funk, rock ‘n’ roll, poetry and high energy. These are some of the terms the Quad-City based group Strange Neighbors use to describe itself.

These terms are completely accurate descriptions of the group’s music, its performance and its members’ personalities.

Strange Neighbors formed four years ago when lead vocalist Terrence Wallace happened to stop by and jam with another Quad-City group called the Chopper’s Club Band. This band was fronted by guitarist/percussionist Dustin Cobb and drummer Ryan Summers.

Summers and Cobb enjoyed playing with Wallace so much that they invited him to join the group, which eventually changed its name to Strange Neighbors after adding a new bassist, Brandon Loveless.

“I had just gotten out of the army,” Wallace explained, “and was looking for something to do. I just happened to go to one of their practices and sang some songs. Then they asked me to join them.

“I hadn’t planned on becoming a musician,” he concluded. “I was planning to be a teacher. In fact, I’m still going to school at Blackhawk College to pursue that career. But right now, my goal is to do nothing but make music. It’s what I love, and it’s all I want to do. Music is an outlet for my emotions. It’s what we crave; it’s like a drug for us.”

Strange Neighbors, known for stage shows that encompass an intense light show and over a thousand square feet of tie-dyed material as a backdrop, got its name from a family who lives near the place where it practices.

“We practice out in the country,” Wallace explained, “way out in the boonies in the loft of a barn where we thought nobody would disturb us. But then this family decided to build a house near the barn.

“They would hear us playing our music,” he continued, “and they would call the police about the noise. But we weren’t doing anything wrong because the sound ordinances allow louder noise out in the country. So now these people constantly keep an eye on us; they watch us with binoculars and stuff. They’re our strange neighbors.”

The group has not only overcome its neighborly problem, but it has also succeeded in meeting its goal of making great music. Its first CD, “From In Here,” was released in January of 1996 and went on to sell over 2,000 copies in a year.

That might not sound like much when compared to platinum-selling artists that are frequently rotated on radio stations nationwide, but Strange Neighbors didn’t exactly have media support during that time or a solid music scene to support them.

“The Quad-Cities scene was pretty rough for a long time,” Wallace explained. “Places wouldn’t book you if you didn’t play cover songs, and we only play original music. But we developed a huge following in the area and that led to some changes in the music scene.

“The scene switched to original music,” he continued, “because it realized that we could get a draw. There was a misconception that people wouldn’t come out if the music wasn’t written by someone else, but that’s not true because we had the biggest draw of any band in the area.”

The group has accomplished quite a bit since then. Members have relentlessly worked to deliver their music to the people and have done this by operating every aspect of the band themselves.

Cobb is the group’s manager and booking agent, Summers is the distribution manager, Loveless is in charge of broadcast media and Wallace is in charge of print media.

Through each member’s unflinching dedication, the group has managed to create its own record company (Passion Flower Records), has had its music added to hundreds of radio stations across the nation and has been able to book its own tours.

“It’s been one of the hardest things we’ve ever done,” Wallace said. “It’s been really hectic. But we did it all ourselves, from searching for venues to sending out promotional information to producing our own CDs.”

The group recently released a live CD, “Live at the Edge of the Rainbow,” which is expected to sell more than 3,000 copies this year. The group will promote this new release by launching a Southwestern tour of the United States that will eventually take them to Mexico.

“The new CD really shows where our energy and strength is,” Wallace said. “It was recorded completely live, with no overdubs. Playing live is the root of what we do. People come up to us all the time and tell us that our music changed their life.

“Our music can change your life, honestly,” he noted, “because our music is almost entirely positive. It makes people want to smile and dance. We stay away from the angst found in music today. That angst is not what we want to convey to the people. Nobody wants to feel those emotions all the time.”

The tour, which involves more than 40 different dates, kicks off Friday night at the Lost and Found. The group will also be playing there Saturday night. Both shows will begin at 10 p.m. Cover is $3.

Strange Neighbors also plans on ending the tour with a homecoming concert in Ames sometime in May.