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Posted By: René on May 1, 2012
Voice of America, official external broadcast institution of the United States federal government, did a video/audio piece on the inspiration behind the “Route 42″ video. Thanks to VofA for sending this song around the world!
Listen to the full article here.
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: music video, Route 42, voice of america
Posted By: René on March 2, 2012
Vicky Hallet of the Washington Post Express wrote up a great little piece on the “Route 42″ music video:
Want to hop on a bus without paying the fare? Catch the new music video for “Route 42,” a hummable ode to public transportation by local singer-songwriter René Moffatt. Although a lot of the lyrics are about waiting — and wondering, as many of us have, “When do I start walking?” — Moffatt knew his video would need some footage on an actual bus.
Renting one for the shoot was going to cost nearly $1,000, which would have broken the budget he cobbled together from online fundraising and a grant from the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities. So WMATA offered him another option: Use your SmarTrip card. “They said, ‘If you’ve got a small camera setup, don’t bother the driver and don’t make a ruckus, you should be OK,’” Moffatt says.
The real challenge was finding two empty seats next to each other: one for Moffatt, the other for the actress playing a girl who won’t stop yapping on her cell phone. When the crew fi nally settled on a workable setup, there was no way to hide what they were doing from the rest of the passengers. But no one seemed to mind; other riders pitched in with unsolicited directing advice.
It’s that community of the bus, the shared experience of folks without their own wheels, that inspired Moffatt, 32, to pen the song in the first place. It’s nominally about the 42, a route that goes from Gallery Place to Mount Pleasant, but the lyrics evoke issues that are relatable for any transit rider in Washington — the letdown of seeing an “Out of Service” bus roll up, the fear of getting stuck in a traffic circle courtesy of Pierre L’Enfant, the growing annoyance at other riders who request every single stop on a line.
Whenever he plays the song in town, he hears from audience members who want him to sing about their own bus lines. The most common request is for the 43, the 42’s speedier sister that sneaks under Dupont Circle. “I could do a version without the bridge, so it’ll go quicker,” Moffatt jokes.
But he thinks there’s something special about his bus, beyond the fact that it allowed him to create such a catchy rhyme (“Here comes that 42/The one that brings me back to you”). It cuts through parts of the city — downtown, Dupont, Adams Morgan, Mount Pleasant — that have been particularly meaningful to the native Texan in the six years he’s lived in the District.
So, until the video launched on Monday, he was anxious that something disastrous might happen to the 42. “I was worried someone would get hit by the bus,” Moffatt says. “Or they could have canceled the route, or reassigned it.”
He appears to have arrived at his desired destination.
– Vicky Hallet, Washington Post
You can download a PDF version of this article here.
Check out the illustration they created for the article.
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: music video, post express, Route 42
Posted By: René on March 1, 2012
See the video on wusa9.com “Singing The Route 42 Blues”
Posted In: News/Press
Posted By: René on February 28, 2012
Gotta love the good-natured folks over at the Washington City Paper. They took time out of their busy, busy workdays to pick apart the song “Route 42″ which was featured a music video I just released. I must thank them for the back-handed exposure, though. Like they say, “give credit where credit is due!”
Read the full article here. And make sure you read the comments, even more entertaining than the piece itself!
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: music video, Route 42, Snarky, Washington City Paper
Posted By: René on February 27, 2012
Check out the article and photos the Washington Post did in response to the release of the “Route 42″ music video
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: music video, Route 42, washington post
Posted By: René on
Prince of Petworth, a well regarded, Washington, DC city blog posted René Moffatt’s new video on their site today. PofP also listed the local businesses who were participating in the video launch.
See the post: René Moffatt releases his first music video, “Route 42”
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: music video, prince of petworth, Route 42
Posted By: René on
Here’s the blurb about the “Route 42″ Video release on the district’s DCist blog.
Note: I later found out that the editor had seen one of my “Route 42″ postcards at Flying Fish, a local coffeeshop who was one of a handful of local stores along the route who I partnered with to launch the video. Goes to show that even old school promotion elements like postcards can find their way into the right hands!
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: dcist, music video, Route 42
Posted By: René on February 15, 2012
René Moffatt’s debut EP “Here And Now Is Home” was nominated for a Wammie in the “Folk-Contemporary Recording” category by the Washington Area Music Association. The album was recorded and produced by Marco Delmar at Recording Arts in Northern Virginia.
View all Wammie nominations here.
Posted In: News/Press
Posted By: René on January 15, 2012
René Moffatt’s song “Demons On Your Sleeve” which is featured on his debut album, Here And Now Is Home, was recently awarded an honorable mention by the Songwriters Association of Washington in their Mid-Atlantic Song Contest (MASC). The song was recorded with producer Marco Delmar at Recording Arts Studios in Northern Virginia.
Read the full list of 2011 MASC winners here:
Posted In: News/Press
Tags: awards, Mid-Atlantic Song Contest, Saw.org
Posted By: René on June 8, 2011
OnTap Magazine, an entertainment guide based out of Northern Virginia recently reviewed René’s debut album “Here And Now Is Home”
“Rene Moffatt’s been rocking his soulful, upbeat folk-pop around the Washington, DC area for the past few years, pleasing audiences and picking up fans. Now he’s hoping his new record, “Here and Now is Home,” will help unlock the door to bigger crowds and a wider following. He gets off to a good start on the opening track, the rollicking “Simple With You.” Easy and breezy, Moffatt’s tenor pushes the song forward, while Molly Hagen’s backup vocals give the track an extra helping of heart, and a boisterous organ gives it soul. Moffatt has a singer-songwriter’s penchant for melancholy too, as he demonstrates on the mournful third track, “You Can Have Your Way With Me.” “I turned off all my telephones/skipped the bars and just went home/gave my way to memory/and let it have its way with me.” Nice turns of phrase like this are evident all over this solid record. Here’s hoping the effort brings Moffatt the attention he deserves in the competitive Washington music scene.-MC”
Read the review at ontaponline.com
Posted In: News/Press
