This Week at the Cactus Cafe

Monday, October 16th Open Mic Night @ 7:30pm [FREE]

Open Mic is back with Hostess Kacy Crowley!! Sign up is promptly at 7:30pm and performances are from 8pm to 10pm.


Wednesday, October 18th Robbie Fulks @ 8:00pm [$20]

In 1993, a songwriter banging around the Chicago club scene with a twangy voice and dangerous sense of humor caught our attention. We started making records with him, and as part of the first-generation Bloodshot roster, Robbie Fulks helped us define “Alternative Country.” In 2013, after two decades of playing music everywhere from the taverns of southern Illinois to the honky-tonks of northern Norway, from Austin City Limits’s soundstage to the historic Grand Ole Opry, he reunited with us for the highly acclaimed Gone Away Backward.

Coming of age in the 1960s and 1970s in Virginia and North Carolina, at the edge of the broad “upland” region referenced in the record’s title, also provided depth and detail for Fulks’s songs about the mysteries of memory, the vanishing of cherished things, and the struggles of everyday life. Robbie tries to make songs that offer more than verse-chorus-hook: songs that have space, calmness, unresolved tensions, and the hallmarks of lived experience. This sort of complexity is displayed in “Fare Thee Well, Carolina Gals,” an intimate folk song from the perspective of a man who has let life’s possibilities pass him by, and in “Never Come Home,” in which a sick man returns to spend his last days among an unwelcoming clan of pious, hard-bitten East Tennesseans.


Friday, October 20th The Deer w/ Valley Queen @ 8:00pm [$15]

The Deer: The Deer moves fluidly between genres, eliciting emotion as varied and surprising as Tempest & Rapture implies. The Deer have played Austin’s historic Moody Theater and the Legendary Stubb’s, as well as festivals like Kerrville Folk Festival, Old Settler’s Music Festival, Utopiafest, and Oregon Country Fair. Members have shared the stage with Alejandro Escovedo, Peter Rowan, Tony Rice, Tim O’Brien, and Dana Falconberry. Their co-bill roster includes Elephant Revival, Trout Steak Revival, Hot Buttered Rum, Jeff Austin, and more.

Valley Queen: Valley Queen front woman Natalie Carol leads a band reminiscent of Fleetwood Mac and My Morning Jacket with vocals evocative of Florence Welch. Neil Wogensen (Bass & Vocals), Shawn Morones (Lead Guitar & Vocals) and Gerry Doot (drums), enrich the songs with energy, excitement and emotion.


Saturday, October 21st Maria Muldaur @ 8:00pm [$25 Advance – $30 Door]

Maria Muldaur is best known world-wide for her 1974 mega-hit “Midnight at the Oasis,” which received several Grammy nominations, and enshrined her forever in the hearts of Baby Boomers everywhere; but despite her considerable pop music success, her 52-year career could best be described a long and adventurous odyssey through the various forms of American Roots Music. During the folk revival of the early ’60s, she began exploring and singing early Blues, Bluegrass and Appalachian “Old Timey” Music, beginning her recording career in 1963 with the Even Dozen Jug Band and shortly thereafter, joining the very popular Jim Kweskin Jug Band, touring and recording with them throughout the ’60s. In the 42 years since “Midnight at the Oasis,” Maria has toured extensively worldwide and has recorded 40 solo albums covering all kinds of American Roots Music, including Gospel, R&B, Jazz and Big Band (not to mention several award-winning children’s albums), before settling comfortably into her favorite idiom, the Blues, in recent years. Often joining forces with some of the top names in the business, Maria has recorded and produced on- average an album per year, several of which have been nominated for Grammy and other awards. Her critically acclaimed 2001 Stony Plain Records release, Richland Woman Blues, was nominated for a Grammy and by the Blues Foundation as Best Traditional Blues Album of the Year, as was the follow up to that album, Sweet Lovin’ Ol’ Soul.

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