Brandon Hudgeons Ft. Matthew Payne Live at The Cactus Cafe!

Buy Tickets! Brandon Hudgeons has been making up songs since he could hold a guitar. He was born and raised in Midland, Texas. An early passion for music and an obsession with 70s and 80s country songcraft led to rock bands, a folk trio at Dartmouth, and decades in the Austin rooms where Texas songwriting lives. Never too far from the music, Brandon finally made a commitment in 2022. It started while listening to a podcast interview with one of his favorite Austin songwriters, Graham Wilkinson, who said, “Anybody can get good enough to play shitty bars.” Brandon thought, “Well, hell, I’m anybody.” Then Todd Snider closed a magical show at the Paramount by saying, “If any of y’all want to come out here and chase songs with us, I don’t see how any bad can come of it.” On his birthday in 2022, he set a deadline: 1,461 days (four years) to write 12 songs good enough to justify an album. The kind he’s been chasing his whole life: Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Jerry Jeff Walker, Rodney Crowell. The discipline is real. Hudgeons writes at least one song every week — a consecutive streak now 110 weeks long — as part of the Song Club that he started and operates as its benevolent dictator. He works all of the local Austin songwriter stages, including Cactus Cafe, Hole in the Wall, Carousel Lounge, and Batch Austin. Eight notebooks full of lyrics. A 1989 Provan Tiger Astro van that doubles as his tour bus, festival home, and mobile songwriting vessel.