Clannad
Landmarks (Atlantic) (star) (star) (star) 1/2
Without Clannad and sibling Enya around to popularize atmospheric Celtic music, it’s quite possible that the “Titanic” soundtrack would have been bogged down with Whitney Houston tunes and “Riverdance” might have been just so many Phil Coulter jigs. Such is the influence of songstress Maire Brennan, who with brother Ciaran on bass and keyboards and their uncles Noel and Padraig Duggan on guitars comprise Clannad. “Landmarks” reaches from the pastoral somberness of “Of This Land,” sung amid fluid Spanish guitar lines, to the lively “A Mhuirnan O.” The lyrics — touching on vague pagan notions of man’s link to his surroundings — are divided between Gaelic and English, but Clannad’s celestial music transcends language.