Cactus Lee w/ Josh Halper

For years Cactus Lee has quietly made records at a relentless pace, plugging along and playing out at local honky tonks in and around his hometown of Austin, Texas.

What began as a home recording project for songwriter Kevin Dehan in 2019 quickly became a group with rotating members and pick-up bands along the way. The project has played New York and Los Angeles multiple times, as well as a Chicago residency as part of the Cosmic Country showcase.

The new album, Lee’s Dream will be released on vinyl February 21 with a special album release show in London, UK at The Lexington. A digital and retail release will follow on April 10, 2026.

The album, his second for Western Vinyl, was conceived while on a monthlong solo tour. He stopped at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, where he saw a replica of Guy Clark’s basement room.

“This was the place where he smoked cigarettes, repaired guitars, and recorded songs. There’s a wall of cassettes on one side and on the other a guitar hangs with a piece of paper taped on that says ‘EASY MONEY.’ That stuck out to me as I continued on my travels and became the first song I wrote for this record.”

The shows on that tour saw Dehan playing to new faces every night in small cities in the Midwest and the South, writing songs in the van en route to the next one.

“When I got back things in my home life with my family started to get turbulent. It caused me to seriously question whether or not I should be out on the road as much.”

“I took a little time off. I was able to write, which helped me cope with some serious life events. Music is very important to me, but my family will always come first. My wife and daughter.”

Dehan took those songs to Billy Horton’s Fort Horton Studios in Wyldwood, Texas to record. Similar to his work with Charley Crockett and Theo Lawrence, Horton pushed Dehan toward classic country songs and production choices.

“Billy has been making classic records out at his studio for a long time,” shares Dehan. “I went in and he started giving me lists of artists who either I reminded him of or who he thought I should push toward in the process of making this album. John D. Loudermilk, George Hamilton IV, Glen Campbell and early Gordon Lightfoot were artists that Billy put on a playlist for me to listen to.”

Horton’s nostalgic taste leans heavily on the Sun Records era of recording. He pushed Dehan to think as a solo artist bringing songs into the studio for a band to pick up and flesh out, a thought not wholly unfamiliar to his home recording roots. Dehan took those initial recording sessions with Horton home to put the finishing touches on, with bass and piano being recorded by Jack Montesinos and Joe Roddy from the Point, and Lindsey Verrill of Little Mazarn lending flute and cello. The album feels communal, lived-in, joyous, and melancholy.

A lifelong Texan, Dehan writes about the Armadillo World Headquarters, Lone Star beer, and Valentine, Texas. He sings of easy money, bad luck, and seeing spots. A historian as much a songwriter, Dehan pulls from music and country folklore to illuminate archetypes in his writing, often crafting melodic fever dreams that feel instantly familiar.

Visually he takes it even further. His last record licensed an image from the great R. Crumb, with this album’s artwork adapted directly from Roger Miller’s 1964 debut album Roger and Out, even adapting the liner notes to read:

“Cactus Lee is a recording artist through and through. He has written some of the finest tunes in the Country & Western field, and some of the ‘farthest out’ songs in all fields. He is a stickler for originality. Seldom, if ever, will he co-write. He doesn’t need to, as any listener to this album will hear.

The idea must be Lee’s own idea—

the dream must be LEE’S DREAM!”

LEE’S DREAM Track Listing

1. “Baltimore” (Dehan)
2. “Easy Money” (Dehan)
3. “By Sunday” (Dehan)
4. “Dead Dillo” (Dehan)
5. “Lee’s Dream” (Dehan)
6. “Bad Luck” (Dehan)
7. “Lone Star” (Dehan)
8. “Seeing Spots” (Dehan)
9. “Fool’s Gold” (Dehan)
10. “Valentine” (Dehan)

___________

At once confident and exploratory, Schlemiel captures Josh Halper at his most settled yet, which is to say, getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. Combining alt-countrypolitan folk rock songs, windswept anthems that recall the War on Drugs’ dreamy updates on classic heartland rock, expertly laid-back ensemble jamming, and cinematic fingerpicked instrumentals that suggest Halper could make a top-notch William Tyler-esque solo guitar LP any time he wants, Schlemiel follows in the vein of his 2020 debut Alrightnik’s wryly funny yet poignant ruminations. But where its predecessor mostly meditated on the conflict within oneself, Schlemiel also investigates the conflicts in relationships that accompany growing up, winding through terse conversations and stalemated silences between childhood friends and ex-lovers, with a bitingly contemporary lyrical sensibility that sits pleasingly in tension with the classic sonic palette. Unconsciously written in the year leading up to a move away from Halper’s native Nashville, the record feels like the air right as the season begins to change—restless—ushering in something new. 

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