Clannad - Anam (1992)

The Brennan family and their band Clannad led the new Celtic music revolution for many years, with a string of solid acoustic albums that made them a must to hear. But with the success of Brennan diva Enya, and the popularity the band achieved as their "Harry's Game" made it into TV and movies, they have slowly turned a course toward a more popular sound, awash in layered voices, reverb, and synthesizers. Anam is the center ground between the two careers, with plenty of rootsy folk supplied by fiddle, bouzouki, guitars, and harp. And it's impossible not to like the singing of Marie and Ciaran Brennan. But the album also marks the beginning of that wash of sound that was to make them famous, so this is possibly the last truly "Irish" album they made and the first "new-Celtic" one. --Louis Gibson