The better part of a decade ago, I used to play the ending of Metal Gear Solid over and over just to hear this Gaelic music from the ending credits:
Eventually I found a soundtrack CD on Ebay. It was sung by Aoife Ní Fhearraigh but I think it was written by the game composer. I found some music from that singer, but it wasn’t the same. I’d love to find more music like that.
How can no one have mentioned Gaelic Storm yet? They have the #1 album right now, and have been huge in the previous decade. They met Michael Flatley once and thanked him for popularizing the culture in America. The humble Flatley claimed that Gaelic Storm had done more for the culture than himself.
Perhaps you’ve seen them perform in this little-known movie?
ETA: #1 on the Billboard World chart, that is.
To be specific, the commerial is for Visa, and everything featured has to do with the New England Patriots. What goes over most people’s heads is that the song is I’m Shipping Up To Boston by Dropkick Murphys.
Kíla are quite popular here.
Knew a few of them back in the day. Fun to trip with 
Might as well plug a few of my favorites:
Planxty
Bothy Band (played this at our wedding)
Julie Fowlis
Alan Stivell
Silly Wizard
Bummer about Liam Clancy. Saw him with Tommy Makem in Houston back in the '80s. Great show.
I’m a newcomer to DM. I only have Do Or Die. Any other recommendations?
Never forget the long-term popular groups: the Chieftans and the Irish Rovers.
Love the Chieftains. Saw them live about 10 years ago.
There is so much out there.
Just go to Green Linnet Records and you’ll get a good head start on the more traditional stuff.
Celtic and Celtic punk have always had their fans in the States, but it does sort of ebb and flow. When I heard the Dropkick Murphys’ “Shipping” on the soundtrack for The Departed, I had a feeling there would be another upsurge. Does anyone else remember the popularity of “Music for a Found Harmonium” on Napoleon Dynamite?
That was Patrick Street covering the song, who are a great live band.
Then there are the Saw Doctors. Those guys illustrate one of the things I like best about any kind of Celtic music: a sense of humor along with the pathos.
And Flogging Molly, and yes, the grandaddies the Pogues. Just saw the Pogues at the end of October, the band was as tight and professional as ever, but Shane McGowan was pretty bad. 
I think that’s their best, Johnny, when the Irish influence was in the background. They also changed their singer after that one IIRC, and I’m not as fond of the newer guy’s sound.
That’s speaking as someone who doesn’t really care for celtic punk, though - it’s OK, but just sounds weak compared to the real thing IMO. The real thing being traditional arrangements of the songs by the great Irish singers. The DMs covered rocky road to Dublin on ‘Sing Loud, sing proud’, a later album, and it’s absolutely fine, decent tune, but compare it to Luke Kelly belting it out with just a banjo for accompaniment and there’s no comparison. *Galway races *is another classic Kelly song that manages to sound less hardcore when you add 3 guitars and a belting punk rock vocal courtesy of Flogging Molly.
Do or Die is a terrific album, though.
No they don’t. Billboard – Music Charts, News, Photos & Video
In fact, they haven’t put out a CD in over a year.
They are AMAZING live but curiously at their gigs I’ve attended here I would reckon most of the crowd wasn’t Irish. Nearly all North Americans and other Europeans at the couple I’ve attended. The dreadlock brigade seem to be the main Irish fans. 
I have The Chieftains and The Dubliners on a cassette tape I made back in the mid-'80s. Borrowed the records from a coworker.
I like Celtic Punk. Kind of funny hearing the put-on accents of Flogging Molly, but I like the music.
The Pogues popped up several times on the iPod yesterday. I like all of their albums, but the earlier ones where they played more traditional songs are better IMO. And Shane is actually coherent.
The curious thing is that the lead singer is from Dublin, Ireland.
He’s spent too long in L.A., then! 
Won’t argue with that, but just wanted to make the point that “Celtic” music is alive in the west (and more sporadically in other parts) of Ireland in the form of tradional music pub sessions. Sure, some of these are put on for tourists and sure, there is a huge foreign input (I’ve been to one quality session featuring one Irishman, me (Dutch) and four Japanese musicians. It was a bit like that Father Ted episode with the Chinese), but traditional music is a real and living tradition kept alive in rural communities. Agree, though, that apart from local radio, it doesn’t feature all that much in the great scheme of money and media and that many Irish people would run a mile rather than listen to diddly-eye music.
Mind you, no piss-up in the west is ever complete without a drunken rendition of The Fields of Athenry. Loooooooooow Liiiiiiiiiiie…
I was a really big Chieftains fan back in the 80’s. I wish that I could say that I started being a fan since Barry Lyndon came out. I still have 10 or so of their CDs, but rarely listen to them anymore. I also had some vinyl of them.
I’d recommend their third album, Sing Loud, Sing Proud! But really, I’m fond of all of their albums other than the second one, The Gang’s All Here. The third album struck a good balance between the rougher sound of the first album and the polished later releases.
Order placed.