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After tending bar for years at Smithwick’s, Irish expats Loretta Heaney and Samantha Meehan bought the bar and refashioned it as a haven for their homeland’s traditional jams ("ceol" is Gaelic for music). Twice a week, musicians rock fiddles in front of the fireplace. On any other night of the week, a dressed-down, late-twenties crowd is enthusiastic for guest-bartender nights, karaoke, and bingo. The charming, dim space is plastered with requisite old Guinness ads, Irish-immigrant photos, Celtic crosses, Irish harps, and snapshots of Frank McCourt, but Ceol is only nominally stuck in the past: When the bartender rings the bell on quiz night, everyone downs a decidedly modern Irish Car Bomb. — Hugh Gallagher