Review by 10 Magazine, South Korea

Review by Ariel Publicity

Review By Paul Kerry of the Korean Herald

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Review by Michael Berry of 10 Magazine, South Korea
Mustache Fable offers up powerful proof that the quality tunesmithing acumen presently emanating from Seoul’s burgeoning expat music scene doesn’t have to emerge through an indie/alt. rock filter in order to maintain a workable, creative, and essentially DIY ethic. This poetic, imaginative effort carries itself with purpose and passion on its journey through the DIY soundscape: sometimes meandering, sometimes challenging, and sometimes wistfully expectant and hopeful, but always engaging. The album is the brainchild of Danielle Arsenault, an expat “renaissance woman” who has brought myriad streams of creative talent to bear. Influences from Cyndi Lauper (“On Time out of Time”) and Allen Ginsburg’s Howl (“Once Destroyed with Tears of Joy”) vie with world music (“Elle Que Viva en la Esperanza”), and offbeat excursions (“We Pray”) to further strengthen the DIY impulse. Finally, the entire album has no physical dimension: it can only be acquired through download via a personal code after you purchase it online. Total DIY, and well worth it!

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Review by Alex Henderson of Ariel Publicity

Upon hearing that Mustache Fable’s Danielle Arsenault is based in South Korea, some might assume that her focus is Asian pop. But there is no Asian pop to be found on Mustache Fable’s debut album, Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death. Instead, Mustache Fable favors a quirky, eccentric style of English-language alternative pop-rock that often incorporates folk-rock elements.

The brains behind Mustache Fable is obviously Arsenault, a singer/songwriter who grew up in Saskatchewan, Canada and has spent the last four years working as an English teacher in South Korea. Arsenault has some help on Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death, including producer Geoff Nostrant on drums and keyboards from time to time and Oliver Walker on bass and background vocals on a few tracks. But Arsenault is clearly the one in the driver’s seat; she wrote all of the material on this release, and for all intents and purposes, Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death is really a solo outing rather than the work of a full-fledged group. Indeed, it is Arsenault’s goofy musical personality that makes Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death a creative success. Arsenault has her direct or indirect influences, including Suzanne Vega, Edie Brickell, Tori Amos and the Cocteau Twins. But the eccentricity that she displays on this 2012 release is an eccentricity of her own.

Arsenault’s lyrics do not go out of their way to be accessible. She has a background in spoken word poetry, and that explains why her lyrics tend to be on the abstract side. And despite her melodic and harmonic eccentricity, Arsenault never comes across as musically elitist or aloof, one gets the impression that she really wants to pull the listener into her quirky, oddball world.

Saying that Arsenault is quirky and eccentric is not to say that she is unmusical or that she is not on solid ground melodically. From a melodic and musical standpoint, Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death has a lot going for it; Arsenault writes appealing, attractive melodies.

Many singer/songwriters accompany themselves on the acoustic guitar, but Arsenault’s instrument of choice on Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death is the ukulele. And her use of that instrument really enhances the album’s folksiness. Arsenault is by no means a folk purist, but folk-rock is a definite influence. Even when Arsenault does some rapping on “Soak Your Life in Music” and the oddly funky “Inspiration Comes to Me,” one hears a folk influence. Arsenault uses hip-hop elements in an alternative pop-rock context. And it works for her.

“Once Destroyed by Tears,” meanwhile, is spoken word. Of course, rapping and spoken word are two different things, but both of them are useful tools in Arsenault’s creative arsenal. So is world music; there is a strong Middle Eastern influence on “Two Truths, One Lie” and “We Pray,” and Arsenault sings in Spanish on the Latin-tinged “Ella Que Vive en la Esperanza” (which means “She Who Lives in Hope”). Latin music, to be sure, is many different things, ranging from Afro-Cuban salsa to Dominican merengue to Brazilian samba to Argentinean tango. And on “Ella Que Vive en la Esperanza,” there are hints of Mexican ranchera music (which makes sense because Arsenault spent some time in Mexico before moving to South Korea).

When Arsenault sings in Spanish on that track, she doesn’t sound like a native speaker but rather, like someone who grew up speaking English as her primary language and learned Spanish as a secondary language. But then, her occasional use of Spanish only adds to the album’s nerdy, offbeat charm. And all things considered, Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death is a memorable effort from Mustache Fable.

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Review By Paul Kerry of the Korean Herald (paulkerry@heraldcorp.com)

Danielle Arsenault is always on the move.

“I have so much energy, even when I’m sitting,” she says. “When I go out with a group of friends I often stand because I just can’t sit very well.”

She doesn’t stand, thankfully, for the interview, but the list of her activities suggests she rarely has a minute to spare.

Arsenault hosts shows, is writing a series of cookbooks and this Saturday is launching an album, “Saving Earthworms from Sun-Scorched Death,” under the pseudonym Mustache Fable.

She is leaving Korea soon to take a three-month course on permaculture in Haiti, helping to rebuild the country’s farming communities, before taking the West Coast trail, a 10-day hike in British Columbia.

Her way of taking a break from all this activity is rock climbing.

“That’s my time to relax and everything just goes away, and all I feel is the rock,” she says.

It’s a hobby that nearly killed her.

Trying to climb along a traverse, she found herself exhausted, and decided to fall deliberately rather than lose control.

“It was going to be a massive fall. It was going to be the biggest fall ever.”

She says this enthusiastically, describing the feeling of falling as if she were looking forward to it, while at the same time admitting it was terrifying.

“I took a deep breath and let go, and the rope just got caught between my leg and flipped me upside down.”

“And I wasn’t wearing a helmet ― and I know that you should always wear a helmet ― so I put my hands up like that to protect my head and smashed into the wall and cracked 5 of my ribs.”

They weren’t minor fractures. She says her ribs are still strangely aligned and her right lung was punctured and collapsed. They got help from a nearby group, who tried to rig up a chair to carry her, but in the end simply helped her walk down the mountain.

The hospital that greeted her said she must be fine from the look of her, but after an X-ray and other tests rushed her into emergency surgery.

She didn’t tell her parents until afterwards.

“I didn’t want to worry them,” she says. “I would be like ‘OK mom, I had an accident. I’m OK now.’”

The certainty of a positive outcome that this implies demonstrates the positive thinking throughout her music.

The themes can sometimes oppose each other. On one of the songs she wrote in recovery from her climbing accident she calls on people to take control of their lives.

“They are complaining and complaining, but really the choice is up to them,” she says. “They are always looking for someone to come and rescue them and they don’t take the chance.”

Danielle Arsenault (Corey Malcolm Lageunesse)

At the same time, the other song admires the hope many people have that keeps them positive.

Arsenault concedes the contradiction ― hope can be as much a desire for rescue as complaining ― but she puts much more emphasis on the positive outlook the two songs espouse.

This sunny disposition is present in the album’s title.

“When it rains the earthworms come out but then the sun comes out and they get stuck on the sidewalk and shrivel and die,” she says.

“When I was little I used to save the worms. I used to pick them up and put them back in the dirt.”

Arsenault came to Korea with a creative streak, but says she had no musical knowledge.

“I wanted to make music but I didn’t know how because I couldn’t play an instrument. I didn’t want to just sing other people’s songs, I wanted to write my own.”

She picked up a ukulele in Seoul’s Nagwon Arcade during her first year in Korea four years ago.

Her friend told her that she wouldn’t learn to play it, and it would just end up as decoration. This might have turned out true, if she hadn’t been living in a small town in Gangwon Province with time to kill.

“There were only 1,000 people, and I was the only foreigner in the town and there was no one for me to speak to,” she says. “All the younger Koreans had moved away and it was only older Koreans left. I was all alone. I liked it.”

Later she would teach herself how to use a loop machine.

“I guess this is what it’s all about ― gaining new knowledge, learning new things. That’s why I came to Korea, that’s why I’m going to Haiti.”

She also says she learned a lot from production, which she says she sat in on and helped with.

She describes her producer, Geoff Nostrant, as skillful, talented and kind, but is it possible for a can-do person like Arsenault to let someone else take control?

“I think in this instance it wouldn’t be possible,” she says, “because he wouldn’t know what my vision was.”

That aside, the album’s artwork was drawn by Kim Hye-won, who draws under the pen name Wonny Bunny.

Arsenault ditched the idea of a CD, explaining that people just use them to convert them to MP3 files now, but wanted to create something physical and opted for a booklet with lyrics and a download code in it. There is also the option of a simple download without the book.

She says she has hosted events before, but is both excited and anxious about Saturday’s launch.

“I think I’ll be nervous this time because it’s like its all me and I will be on display a little,” she says.

“I’m lucky I have some really talented musicians joining me.

“Normally I play on my own, but I really wanted to have a full sound that really represented the album rather than just by myself.”

The launch of “Saving Earthworms from Sun-Scorched Death” will be on Saturday at 3 p.m. at the Laughing Tree Lab in Itaewon. Support will be from Used Cassettes, CJ IsInfinite and Jennifer Waescher and entry is 10,000 won. You can find out more about Mustache Fable, and download the album, by visiting www.mustachefable.com.

By Paul Kerry (paulkerry@heraldcorp.com)

The song “Two Truths One Lie” was made into Mustache Fable’s first ever music video. It follows a few daring characters on an adventure to climb a frozen waterfall. Little do they know that someone is waiting in the shadows ready to sabotage their efforts.

Watch the Video HERE!

Listen to the Album HERE!

This debut allbum echoes inspirations from wrinkled mountains in different corners of the globe to reflections of society from the comfort of a bedroom. You’ll hear cheerful, uke-infused, folk-esque sounds ringing throughout the album in both English and Spanish. It has a sound of its own and sets a bright tone that blends well with the lyrics. Harmonies ring throughout, peppered with an odd sprinkling of piano, bass guitar, trombone and violin in one track or another. If Suzanne Vega, Tracey Bonham and Ani Difranco and I were to have tea, I’m sure some music making would go down. These tunes will have you singing along as you smile through the streets with a little extra bounce in your step!

Click Here to read the entire interview by AWEH.TV’s own Ollie Walker.

If you don’t know already, IndieGOGO is a fundraising platform to raise money for something you are passionate about. As someone who is interested in fundraising for any type of project within their horizons, one can create a pitch and offer high quality perks that are as diverse as the imagination. My campaign helped me pay for the production costs of the album and the costs of mixing and mastering. I also be had Wonny Bunny Kim design the album cover. In turn I will support a friend who just so happens to be a wonderful graphic designer and self professed chocolate lover.

Visit my bandcamp site to download the album, Saving Earthworms from Sun Scorched Death.

As a tribute to TIME, I created On Time Out of Time for Wordsmiths @ The Lab bringing all of the energy of Wordsmiths: The Web Series to the stage. The night included performances by featured guests as well as an open mic, plus The After Set by the very talented Mr. Oilcan Boyd.

This event took place on Sunday, October 16th, 2011.

The episode in the web series, Wordsmiths: On Time was also featured.

Featured Guests included

Come to Lyrically Minded

This is an open mic event, so if you are a poet, emcee, storyteller, spoken word veteran or open mic virgin, please come along and share your words with the rest of us.

The event will be hosted by Carys Jones, and Dante Threats will be spinning a blend of downtempo hip hop, neo-soul & just good music in general.

Mustache Fable will be revealing some new songs if you feel inclined to attend.

This video was created for OBSTRUCTURE, a creative endeavour that provides the artistic community with a series of obsticles where the results are gathered in a quarterly ‘zine.
The theme of this issue was “SIJO”
Sijo is a type of Korean poetry and it only needs three simple lines.

The sijo may be narrative or thematic, introducing a situation or problem in line 1, development or “turn” in line 2, and resolution in line 3. The first half of the final line employs a “twist”: a surprise of meaning, sound, tone or other device. The sijo is often more lyrical, subjective and personal than haiku, and the final line can take a profound, witty, humorous or proverbial turn. Like haiku, sijo has a strong basis in nature, but, unlike that genre, it frequently employs metaphors, symbols, puns, allusions and similar word play.

This is my SIJO.

Air warms and Heartbeats flutter, awake from sluggish sleep-chilled bones
Baby bird beaks break their eggs, in their mothered microcosm
Muffled roars of cyclic habit rage fertilizer wars 

I was interviewed on Arirang Radio in Seoul, South Korea last October.
Click here and you can hear the interview on Soundcloud.