First stop on our tour of the regional scenes: the five boroughs, Long Island, upstate and across the Hudson to Jersey. There’s a world record on Second Avenue, the Bronx bar-band tradition is alive and still thirsty, and Brooklyn is about to get a double helping of new-wave Irish trad. Here’s the NY/NJ radar from mid-October through Christmas.

The Prodigals are officially in the book. Guinness World Records has certified Gregory Grene’s jig-punk lifers for the longest annual residency by a band: 29 years at Paddy Reilly’s Music Bar on Second Avenue, going back to St. Patrick’s Day 1997 and north of 1,500 shows. They still play there every Friday and Saturday, so you’ve no excuse. Your liver aches just reading that.

Shilelagh Law, billed as “New York’s thirstiest band,” have the diary full through the holidays: Downey’s in Riverdale (October 17), Long Island Irish Fest VI at Plattduetsche Park in Franklin Square (October 18, 4pm), McGovern’s Tavern in Newark (November 21) and the Rambling House in the Bronx (December 5). Then the big one: their Christmas in NY show at Connolly’s Times Square on December 18, before they sign off 2026 at the Belle Harbor Yacht Club in Rockaway the next night. Odds on “Christmas in New York” getting an airing: short.

Bronx crew The Narrowbacks have been putting out singles rather than albums lately, the latest being March’s “Take The Wheel.” Catch them at Ulysses Folk House on Stone Street in the Financial District on Saturday, November 21 (9pm).

Coming through town

• Tullamore trio Chasing Abbey bring the Cyber Celt tour to Warsaw in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, on Saturday, October 17.
• Dublin’s Madra Salach play their first-ever New York shows: Mercury Lounge (November 6), Union Pool in Williamsburg (November 7) and Baby’s All Right (November 10).
• Boston’s The Gobshites return to Roger’s Pub in Rockaway Beach, November 13 and 14.
• Jersey Shore export Sean Tobin, now in Nashville, releases his sixth album Banshee River on October 23, a solo record cut alone to four-track cassette, then brings it home: Berlin Brewing Co. in Berlin (October 29), Tir na nOg in Trenton (October 30) and the Danny Clinch Transparent Gallery in Asbury Park with JM Stevens (November 28).
• Rochester-born, Nashville-based Irish psychobilly punks 1916 head home for Rochester’s Photo City Music Hall on Friday, December 18 (18+).