Here’s one of those coincidences that make the world seem nicely symmetrical:

I happened to be looking for a version of the old Irving Berlin song “Blue Skies” this afternoon and eventually found a good one by the American jazz singer Maxine Sullivan, recorded in 1937:

Maxine Sullivan’s biggest hit, somewhat oddly, was her jaunty recording of the traditional Scottish tune “Loch Lomond”. That’s why her greatest hits CD (shown in the video above) was called “Loch Lomond: Greatest Hits 1937-1942”.

While listening to “Blue Skies”, however, I noticed a video for a 60s group from Boston called the Rockin’ Ramrods. It’s called “Bright Lit Blue Skies” and is pretty good:

Now, somewhere along the way, the Rockin’ Ramrods shortened their name and became the Ramrods. This, however, led to some confusion, because a rock band from nearby Connecticut already went by that name. 

These other Ramrods had one hit, an instrumental version of “Ghost Riders in the Sky”. Unfortunately, their follow-up single, released in 1960, didn’t become a hit.

But it was called “Loch Lomond Rock”:

If only they’d called it “Rockin’ Loch Lomond”. That would have been perfect.