October 2008 Archive |
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Castanets
City of Refuge
Review By Chris Pacifico
Singing with the voice of some backwoods country rube all spaced out on whatever you could get over the counter at a turn-of-the-century pharmacy never sounded quite so eloquent and tantalizing until Castanets’ Raymond Raposa started recording and releasing music. City of Refuge was cut with just him holed up in some motel out in the sticks and makes for what is Castanets’ darkest piece to date. Raposa sings in a chilling nasal pitched voice with a tad bit of a drawl as his stringy guitar work is backed with droning haze that enhances his eerie solitude.
“Refuge 1” will make the hair on the listeners skin stand straight when up his voice slowly builds up as ambient flutters lilt their way down while “Ill Fly Away” is a whole new take on the old timey spirituals as Raposa’s singing actually makes his voice sound like it’s lifting off the ground. “Savage” brings out molten doom melting and swish swashing with the guitars and, like all the other tracks, has tiny hisses and reverb peppered about. Raposa does a stellar job of jolting you with gathering clouds of stark resonance but you should be warned of the instrumental intervals that make waiting to be further startled by his voice a tad bit annoying but worth it in the end.
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