Isaac Castor

Isaac Castor was born in 1995 in rural Indiana. His family moved around the midwest constantly until 2004 when they settled in Ann Arbor, MI. That same year, Isaac was introduced to the artform of writing rhymes by a friend and began his artistic journey under the stage name "Gameboi."

In 2009, Castor began attending a weekly emcee workshop at an Ann Arbor teen center called The Neutral Zone. After performing at numerous Neutral Zone concerts and establishing a fellowship with his peers in the emcee program, he released his first official project, 2010’s “The Posterchild”.

The Posterchild helped Castor establish himself as a force within the Ann Arbor rap scene. It propelled him into radio appearances and live performances at venues around the state, including an opening slot for Mac Miller’s sold-out Ann Arbor tour date. In 2011, Castor released the EP “Freshman Of The Year.” It was produced primarily by Astronote (known for producing Kendrick Lamar’s “untitled 03”) and assisted heavily by the guidance of A-Side Worldwide’s Jackson Perry. The EP’s lead single, “Act Right”, featured rapper Big Pooh of Little Brother and was produced by 14KT. Act Right caught the attention of producer/DJ Statik Selektah, who played the song on Sirius XM’s Shade 45 and tapped Isaac for a feature on his album “Population Control” later that year.

2012 saw the release of “Young and Restless”, an album that featured contributions from Jon Connor, Skywlkr, XV, One Be Lo of Binary Star and Air Dubai among many others. Castor continued to perform on tour dates of big-time artists such as Pusha-T, Logic and Joey Bada$$. The following year, he dropped the moniker “Gameboi” and began performing under his given name, Isaac Castor.

The world got a chance to know the artist Isaac Castor through his re-introductory single “Heisenberg”, the Jon Connor collaboration entitled “Basics”, and his feature on the title track “Drift” with the runner-up from the “The Voice” Michelle Chamuel and producer Arjun Singh. The Drift EP reached #2 on iTunes Electronic Music charts the week of its release and led to Isaac landing an interview with NPR’s Michigan Radio. Castor and Singh continued to collaborate following the release of Drift, and in 2015 they released a collaborative album titled “High Art”. The album featured Mass Appeal Records artist Boldy James and frequent Vulfpeck collaborator Antwaun Stanley. The release of High Art saw Isaac receive recognition from XXL Magazine in their monthly unsigned artist feature “The Break”.

While in college, Castor began performing frequently with live rock/funk band Hotel Arch. They performed together at the University of Michigan’s Springfest concert as well as the release party for Isaac’s 2016 EP “(Dis)comfort Zone”. He followed up that effort in 2018 with a full-length project titled "Old Soul." The album featured guest appearances from legendary LA emcee Blu and Detroit-based up-and-comer Main Kei, as well as production from PEEKABOO, Hir-O, Ilajide of Clear Soul Forces, Nate Fox, and Castor himself.

After graduating from Western Michigan University, Castor relocated to Detroit and joined forces with the hip hop collective Middle Finger Music, founded by producer Foul Mouth. This led to Isaac and Foul collaborating on a full-length album titled "The Rabbit Hole." The album finds Castor getting darker and more personal than ever before with his lyrics over Foul Mouth's chilling sample-based production. The Rabbit Hole is widely considered by critics and fans to be Castor's best work artistically, and the single "Name 5 Songs" has acheived massive success on TikTok, leading to over 300,000 Spotify streams to date.

Since Rabbit Hole's release coincided with the beginning of the Covid Pandemic, Isaac's releases in the time since have been sporadic. At the end of that year, he was a featured performer during Insane Clown Posse's Christmas Live-Stream. He went on to appear on albums from Detroit hip hop legends such as Fatt Father and Bang Belushi. Most notably, Castor released a collaborative single with bubbling EDM producer Sully called "Right About Now" on Liquid Stranger's Wakaan label.

Castor is now hard at work on a Rabbit Hole sequel with Foul Mouth, as well as a seperate LP with producer Chanes.