Photo Credit / Wall Street Journal
Back Row, (l,r): V (vocalist), J-Hope (rapper), RM (rapper and leader)
Front Row, (l,r): Suga (rapper), Jungkook (vocalist), Jin (vocalist), Jimin (vocalist)
BTS, also known as Beyond the Scene or Bangtan Songyeondan, is a K-pop group that has taken the world by storm in the past few years. It consists of seven members, with three of them being rappers and the other four being vocalists. Even though some people might have only heard about them in 2020, they have been around for a little over seven years.
The group debuted in June of 2013 with their album 2 Cool 4 Skool, which had a hip-hop and rap sound. They also have the biggest fandom in the world, the BTS Army. The term “army” is the perfect name for their fans because they will fight hard for BTS to reach their goals by constantly streaming their music and buying and collecting their albums.
Since then, they have released five Korean albums, four Japanese albums, been on five tours and released four movies. Their music and “bad boy” type sound has evolved a lot since 2013. They started with hip-hop and rap, then they transitioned into incorporating pop music and some ballads in their albums. Starting with their Wings album, all of the boys had their own solo track, each in a different genre. Jungkook’s solo song “Begin” had an EDM feel to it, whereas Suga’s song “First Love” was a slow-paced rap with only piano in the background to tell his story about when he first fell in love with music, specifically the piano. Needless to say, BTS has experimented with a lot of different genres and sounds.
The thing that draws people in the most, when it comes to BTS, is their incredible performances. They are known for their intense and intricate choreography on stage, all the while keeping their vocals spot on. Some of their most well-known choreography routines are “Fake Love”, “Mic Drop”, “Blood Sweat and Tears”, and “DNA”. They are even known to include dance breaks in some performances, or an intro designed to take their fans’ breath away.
When it comes to awards and accomplishments in the U.S., they are not lacking by any means. Their first album to hit the Billboard Album 200 was The Most Beautiful Moment in Life, Part 2. Their Wings album was the first to hit the Social 50 Billboard chart at number 26. In 2017, they made their first American award show appearance at the Billboard Music Awards, where they won top social artist, breaking Justin Bieber’s six-year streak. They also had their U.S. performance debut when they performed “DNA” at the American Music Awards, and became the first K-pop group to perform at Dick Clark’s New Years’ Eve celebration. In 2018, they spoke at the United Nations to encourage young people to join efforts against discrimination and poverty.
BTS made their first Grammy appearance in 2019 when they presented an award. The next time that they appeared on the Grammy stage was alongside Lil Nas X for “Old Town Road” in 2020.
BTS continued to produce in 2020, with the COVID-19 pandemic only pushing them to work harder and make more music for their fans. They released Map of the Soul: 7, “Dynamite”, and BE. They appeared on James Corden’s Carpool Karaoke for the first time, and took over Jimmy Fallon’s talk show, performing every single night for a week.
Their first English song, “Dynamite,” blew up the Billboard charts, charting No. 1 for four consecutive weeks and eventually becoming the song that landed them the Grammy nomination and performance. Even though they didn’t win their category at the Grammys, all anyone could focus on was how good their performance was. Twitter blew up and was trending #Scammys before the telecast even started. Once it was announced that BTS lost their category, the conversation circling around the Grammys became negative very quickly. There are a ton of articles out now talking about the Grammys using BTS performing for clout without recognizing the real impact and success their music made this past year. Now thanks to Forbes and a bunch of others, the real question is do BTS really need the Grammys, or do the Grammys need BTS?
Anaïs BTS Je t aime ❤❤❤❤👍👋