Watch Billy Gibbons In High Desert Honky-Tonk For ‘My Lucky Card’ Video
The new video was filmed in and around the famous cantina Pappy & Harriet’s Pioneertown Palace.
Billy Gibbons has released the third preview single and video for his upcoming third solo album release Hardware. The track is the typically robust rocker “My Lucky Card,” which follows the recent appearances of “Desert High” and before that “West Coast Junkie.”
Hardware is set for June 4 release by Concord Records as the follow-up to Gibbons’ 2018 set The Big Bad Blues, which was honored with the Blues Foundation’s Blues Music Award.
The new video was filmed in and around Pappy & Harriet’s Pioneertown Palace. The famous cantina/honky-tonk was built as part of the western movie set on which the popular US TV series The Cisco Kid and The Gene Autry Show were filmed, both from 1950 to 1956. It was also the setting for the 1953 film noir Jeopardy, starring Barbara Stanwyck and Barry Sullivan, and 1972’s The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean.
“We thought Pappy’s would be a great place for us to do the video since it reflects the rough and tumble high desert vibe that was the inspiration for the album,” says Gibbons. He adds that the stage performance of the song in the video is the first and only take. “I play a slide guitar in this one but neglected to bring a proper slide along for the shoot.
“Necessity being a mother, we improvised and used a beer bottle. We went through a case or more looking for just the right bottle neck and, at last, found one on a classic Mexican brew. That was some thirst-quenching research to be sure.”
The clip was directed, like its two predecessors on the new album, by Harry Reese, a filmmaker from Shiner, TX who also shot three videos for The Big Bad Blues. “It was a one-man shoot – me – with no crew and using available light, flying by the seat of our pants,” says Reese. “Billy, Matt [Sorum] and Austin [Hanks] got up there, did it once and Billy said, ‘We got it!’ and that was that.”
Robyn Celia and Linda Krantz, the owners of Pappy & Harriet for the past 15 years, recently sold the cantina, so the video will stand as a salute to its history. Gibbons and the entire band and crew have paid tribute to the couple for giving them the run of Pappy’s for an entire day.
Photo: Harry Reese
The video also features two members of staff who were pressed into service as a card dealer and a resident drunk. The bartender was played by Mike Florentino, one of the co-producers of Hardware. It ends with high desert “pop provacateur” Jesika Von Rabbit, pulling an ace from the deck.
“Matt’s wife is Ace Harper,” says Gibbons, “and she is, no doubt, his ’lucky card’ so this is something of a tribute to her in light of the fact that she’s expecting their first child shortly. In some unexpected and quite spontaneous way, this all ties together.”
Hardware is released on June 4. Pre-order it here.
