Raymond Raposa—the singer-songwriter who recorded under the name Castanets—has died at the age of 41. Raposa’s longtime label Asthmatic Kitty confirmed the news earlier today (July 30) via a post on ...

In 2001, Jesse Ainslie quit his Chapel Hill band, Straight No Chaser, and moved to Florida. Soon, he was in New York, studying creative writing and musicology at the New School University. In 2005, he ...

Often dismissed as little more than a niche songwriter futzing with the boundaries of his own woodsy, quasi-Americana palate, Ray Raposa (a.k.a. Castanets) has remained a sorely overlooked act. Often ...

Ray Raposa, the folk artist best known for his music as Castanets, has died at age 41. Via Pitchfork, the news came via Sufjan Stevens‘ Asthmatic Kitty label, who released much of Raposa’s work and ...

After his Castanets project vanished off the map in 2009, Raymond Raposa brings the experimental folk project back for another go-round. Decimation Blues is a fragmented album that trends toward the ...

The singer-songwriter behind psychedelic folk-blues band the Castanets has passed away. “It is with great sorrow that the family of Raymond Raposa announce his passing today,” reads an online ...

The Castanets is Ray Raposa, a San Diego native whose album City of Refuge is an exercise in solitude. Raposa recorded the album in Overton, Nevada, a two-bar town ...