THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,424) Barry Goldberg Reunion — “Hole in My Pocket”
This ’68 A-side and track on the BGR’s only LP reached #103 on Billboard’ Hot 100 chart (for the week ending October 12, 1968 (Joel Whitburn, Joel Whitburn Presents the Billboard Hot 100 Charts: The Sixties)). Its “[a]n entertaining take on psych tainted fuzzed up Blues. . . . [with g]reat wah-wah fuzz guitar work”. (recorddigger, https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/the-barry-goldberg-reunion/theres-no-hole-in-my-soul/), written by Danny Whitten of the Rockets (to become Crazy Horse). The Rockets had released their own version a month earlier, in July ’68 — produced by BG.
As to the two versions, Larry writes:
The Rockets released one album on White Whale in 1968, after which a large portion of the band (Danny Whitten, Ralph Molina and Billy Talbot) would form the heart of Crazy Horse, working with Neil Young for decades, with the exception of Whitten who died of an OD in 1972. Today’s selection has a slightly shambolic, Basement Tapes-y air to it, with a country fiddle weaving in and out of a (very) crunchy rock band. The rusty saw-ing of fiddler Bobby Notkoff butts right up against the border of ‘annoying’ but manages to fit in with the overall vibe of the band. The production (by Barry Goldberg) is an amiable mess. Interestingly enough, Goldberg (who seems to have dragged Notkoff with him from the Electric Flag) would go on to cover the song later in 1968 with his own band, the Barry Goldberg Reunion.
https://ironleg.wordpress.com/2017/07/09/the-rockets-hole-in-my-pocket/
As to Barry, Max Close writes:
After leaving The Electric Flag, pianist and organist Barry Goldberg formed his own briefly lived group and continued to play the blues, albeit spicing it up with unusual psychedelic rock songs and a fabulous cover of the Beatles’ “Fool on the Hill” . . . . There’s No Hole In My Soul is the record output for the group, a dense piece of varying styles that has something for everyone.
http://therockasteria.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-barry-goldberg-reunion-theres-no.html?m=1
Barry Goldberg was a regular fixture in the white blues firmament of the mid-’60s that seemed to stretch from Chicago to New York. A keyboardist (organ seemed to be his specialty), Barry was an in-demand session man — he appears with Michael Bloomfield on a Mitch Ryder album, for instance — along with Al Kooper and his blues-playing contemporary from the original Butterfield band, Mark Naftalin. Goldberg was a member of Charlie Musselwhite’s first band, contributing great piano and organ lines to the Stand Back! album (his work on “Cristo Redentor” is moody and introspective, with a strong jazz-inflected feel, while still retaining strong blues roots) and a handful of others throughout the decade.
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/barry-goldberg-mn0000142226#biography
Here are the Rockets:
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