It’s been a week since Houston-based comedian Andrew Youngblood released his first comedy special, Andrew Youngblood: I’ll Tell You This, over at the YouTube channel of fellow comedian Mark Normand, whom Youngblood regularly opens for.

A 43-minute set recorded at Youngblood's comedy club, The Secret Group in EaDo, the self-described “dark comedian who hails from upstate New York” does some unfiltered, button-pushing riffs on such topics as To Catch a Predator being his favorite show, Texas “bad guys” like Ted “The Mexican Runaway” Cruz and Greg “Hot Wheels” Abbott (his words), and how much he adores Black people.

“February is my favorite month — Black History Month,” he tells the audience. “Or, as the police calls it, cuffing season.” (When he gets groans from the crowd, he sets them straight: “Listen, guys, I didn’t write that joke — America did. You leave me out of it.”)

While the special has only amassed 17,000 views, the man himself says he has been getting positive feedback on it. “It’s on the internet so, of course, there are gonna be some comments that aren’t nice,” says Youngblood, 38, during a Zoom call from his Houston home. “But that’s just the nature of the Internet, right?”

As a guy who uses the R-word a couple times in his special, Youngblood (who’s been in these standup streets for a decade) knows his snarky, ball-busting but ultimately well-intentioned material is gonna rub some people the wrong way.

“Any bit you’re gonna write about, anything you’re gonna do, someone’s gonna find an issue with it,” he says. “There’s gonna be somebody, right? And I think when you do that, maybe that’s the way you talk or maybe that’s the way you grew up. And I get that times change and you shouldn’t talk a certain way and whatnot. But, also, it’s funny, and I don’t think they would end up in people’s specials or people wouldn’t be using it on stage if it wasn’t funny.”

But don’t put him in the same stable of divisive, brotastic comics/podcasters like Joe Rogan, Tom Segura, and Tony Hinchcliffe, comedians who are also newly-minted Austinites. Youngblood, who considers himself a “Texas liberal,” believes he can make people laugh on both sides of the aisle.

“With comedy, most of us just wanna laugh, right?” he asks. “I think there’s a fake divide that the internet — or maybe the left and right or however you want to do it — has kind of painted this picture. But I think that overall we’re just trying to make people laugh and we’re trying to further our careers and just talk. We’re just trying to laugh ourselves, you know?”

This weekend, Youngblood will be doing several shows at The Riot Comedy Festival, including a live recording of The Mess Hall, a podcast he hosts with fellow comic Jamie Rowan, on Friday. And even though Austin is becoming a comedy hotbed (this year’s Moontower Comedy Festival will start next week), Youngblood loves H-Town too much to bounce.

“I’ve traveled all over the world,” he says. “And I know this seems like pandering or whatever, but this is my favorite city. I think the culture’s great. I think the food’s great. I think the diversity’s great. I think everything about this city is pretty awesome. So, if I am to get a place somewhere else, whether it be LA or New York or Austin, I’ll be splitting my time here. I’ll never leave Houston.”

For more info on Youngblood’s appearances at The Riot Comedy Festival, visit its website.