Texas Forever

Album ∙ Country ∙ 2025

Hudson Westbrook

Hudson Westbrook wears his Texas influences on his sleeve on this full-length debut collection, paying tribute to his home state sonically and thematically across an ambitious 17 tracks. A quickly rising up-and-comer, Westbrook tells Apple Music that Texas Forever spans a formative period and reflects the growth he’s experienced since first coming onto the scene with his viral single “Take It Slow.”

“There are some songs on here from a year and a half ago,” Westbrook says. “And you’re like, ‘This is the headspace I was in when I wrote that song.’ It’s so weird how life changes and how you look back on your album. It’s really cool, because I have the opportunity to show an era of who I am, and then there’s another era, and there’s another era.”

Texas Forever opens with “Darlin’,” a soulful, deceptively sweet song about stealing someone’s girl. The title track likens Westbrook’s deeply rooted connection to his home state to a long-term relationship, and features some of his most image-rich songwriting. “Funny Seeing You Here” is a full-circle kiss-off to an ex-flame, with prominent fiddle and a fiery guitar solo upping the romantic drama. The album also features Westbrook’s hit single “House Again,” a clever and wrenching breakup song that plays with the distinction between a house and a home. Fellow up-and-comer Mackenzie Carpenter is the album’s sole feature, lending her agile lilt to the wistful midtempo ballad “Lie to Me.” Below, Westbrook shares insight into a few key tracks.

“Texas Forever”
“Loyalty to Texas would mean, to me, I’ll never run tracks in my songs. It’s going to be real drums, real everything. And if I can’t stop my live band in the middle of the show without a track playing, then I’m done making music. I don’t like tracks. And, of course, that goes for my lane. Do whatever you want, whatever, but not hating. Melodies matter a lot, and topics of songs. And loyalty to Texas is like, I’ll starch my jeans, but I’m not going to wear a cowboy hat everywhere I go. And then [I’ll take] any chance that I have to give back. There’s a certain thing that if you’re from Texas, you don’t say that you’re country. Nothing on my album is like, ‘I’m country.’ It’s like, ‘I’m drinking beer on a…’ It’s like, ‘Woke up this mornin’ in boots and jeans.’ It’s just topics, you know? And I think that’s my favorite thing to write.”

“House Again”
“We went from a house out in the country—we had five acres, six acres—and then we went to a golf course with a [small] front yard. And so, it felt like a house. My parents put stained concrete, and we had white tile instead, and you had our chaps hung on the wall, but there’s no room for chaps to be hung on the wall anymore. You know what I mean? It’s little things like that that I think make a house a home. You go stay in the bachelorette houses in Nashville, that ain’t a home. Your handprints in the sidewalk whenever you did that with all your family, mud tracks where you drove a four-wheeler through, or anything that’s humanly interacted with by a human. The house can’t interact back—we just make it a home, and we fill it out. I think that’s the difference between an IKEA sofa and a leather one that your grandma passed you down. Little things like that. So, that’s what makes a house a home to me.”

“Hill I’ll Die On”
“The whole album starts off with me stealing this guy’s girl. I’m calling her up, right? I’m calling her darling. He’s calling her up. And then, it kind of just goes through the whole story of boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, heartbreak, love, having fun, and then it ends on ‘Hill I’ll Die On.’ And I just remember after that song, nothing was planned. I didn’t have that tracklisting. I had no idea until I produced it, obviously. And I went into the studio, and at the end of it, I was like, ‘Y’all keep playing.’ And then they kept playing, and I was like, ‘All right, keep playing.’ And then I was like, ‘All right, y’all just rip.’ I just told the studio players, ‘Do whatever you want.’ And so, they just started playing towards the whole end. There’s like a whole minute outro. And then, I don’t know, I think also it represents everything that I am as a person.”