He was gone only a few days, but Beyond the Story – 10 years of BTS history (Mondadori) already number one on the charts Amazon half of the world. No wonder seven Korean boys, RM, Gin, suga, j-hope, jimin, V AND jungkook, born between 1992 and 1997 and debuted in 2013, are not only a K-pop group, but also a universal love movement. The revolution started quietly in the trainee dorm (an apprenticeship period where you learn singing and dancing before making your debut as a idolsed) Seoul, which in a decade reached the entire globe, forming an army, Armywhich is an understatement for being a fanboy.
army of armies
In fact, it’s not just about the fans of their music, but a real army of followers, united by common values, such as exchange and support, which have followed the band from the very beginning through different stages of growth, multiplying year after year. The path so far may resemble that of many K-bands, but I BTS extension I am a special case. Each step of the group that changed the face of Korea in the world is a piece of a complex puzzle, for those who are not inside the phenomenon, consisting of codes that can penetrate souls and be a source of support and support. sometimes even salvation from youthful loneliness with a special emphasis on mental health, on love for oneself and others. A kind of extended family in which there is no separation between group and Army, where both express their fragility, talking about their fears, support and protect each other. So it’s not just about the music.
There is a very close contact between their innermost hearts and their fans, consisting of daily content posted on various platforms including weversea kind of social network created by a South Korean entertainment company Hybe Corporation, the same one that spawned the group, even if in fact thanks to them it has become one of the most important in the world. In the life of the group, as well as individual components performed at any time of the day or night, a unified bond is played out that makes BTS the most innovative, controversial and controversial phenomenon in the music world.
The boys virtually have lunch with ARMYs, talk about their fears, ask for advice, announce record releases, or just pop in for a few minutes on live TV just to ask how they are. A wide variety of topics are covered, including pressure from the entertainment world and even their own record company, effectively turning them into a kind of global group of very close friends. No wonder the leader of the group RM invited with the band to the show James Cordenmanaged to get him to apologize to the army he joked about, which diminished their importance.
bts and the army are changing the world
Similarly, BTS interfered with important political facts by boycotting the 2020 rally. Donald Trump post-pandemic, but also denouncing the grave injustices in their country and placing themselves at the forefront of the fight against any type of discrimination, from gender to race, especially at a time when in America, a nation where their success has reached unexpected heights, hatred of Asians has become a real movement . It was in America that the group won numerous awards, beating the competition of the world’s biggest names in pop music, in fact becoming the first formation to achieve such success outside of Korea, so much so that they were adopted at the White House by President Biden. and spoke at the UN.
The mystery that began in 2013
To be specific, in 568 pages of a book written by a famous Korean music critic Myeongseok Kang, who have spent three years in close contact with the band, there is also a hidden story that is another hallmark of the band, explaining how each of their projects is connected to the previous discourse, consisting not only of music, but also of the path that winds through musical clips, lyrics, photos, concerts and even books. All of this material should be seen as pieces of a puzzle that the Army has been assembling since 2013, the year of its debut. From the beginning, the group created an alternate universe, bangtang universe who see themselves as protagonists spreading clues in videos as well as lyrics, choreography or concept photos.
And again, in the tags posted by the group in some fictitious accounts (like the florist Smeraldo, who suddenly appeared, apparently completely unrelated to the group, whose owner Myself it is a reference to self love. ed.), in the webtoon Save me, in the diaries attached to the albums and in the book notes of the Smeraldo books. There is no real chronological order, different parts of the stories are shuffled. All this so that you don’t just focus on the story, and therefore only on the disc, video or photo, but to go further and find out how these parts come together to give an important lesson to your fans.
How the message is revealed
The way the different scenes are juxtaposed helps us understand the deeper messages the band has been conveying over the years. Many can be deciphered by association with films such as Lost river whose name is written on the garage door in the context of the video. Or with books Catcher in the Rye From J. D. Salingeror Season in Hell poem Arthur Rimbaud, absently resting on a school desk in another video clip. Or even historical events or quotes from other musical groups, as in the case of the poster posted on the street in the video scene, which is actually the cover of the group’s album. Pink Floyd Wish you Were Here. Live in Paris.
In the video of the first We are bulletproof 2020 is the beginning of a story where 7 boys are late for school, and the teacher punishes them by sending them to a closet, where they make friends and get close to each other in that narrow place that will become a refuge. On the walls of this forgotten and dusty classroom, we discover a collage of sentences that are quotes from one of the classics of dystopian literature, the book 1984 From George Orwell. In order to better understand the meaning the band wanted to give to this scene, it is important to mention certain parts of the book.
The story is set in a world dominated by a single party led by a character named Big Brother. People in this world are constantly filmed by the “big eye”. Television is constantly broadcasting propaganda slogans that brainwash citizens into believing they live in an ideal society. Only a few realize that they are slaves. The graphics of the book will be taken from a series of photographs of the band, present in only one version of the album. Love yourself to emphasize the importance of understanding the concept contained in Universe Bangtan.
The book is clearly one metaphor taken to the extreme, modern societies where we are taught from childhood what is right and what is wrong. Religious beliefs, sexuality, aesthetic ideals and prejudices that are injected into us like pills. The same ones that, even years later, appear in many of the band’s videos as a form of condemnation of the dystopian world in which we live, which anesthetizes us, like pills that we are forced to swallow in order to survive.
Starting with the aesthetic canons that we try to be like, which prevent us from appreciating different kinds of beauty, to which we will instead have to re-educate ourselves. All these concepts that influence our thoughts are then reproduced in the band’s videos and presented as veils, curtains or headbands in relation to Veil of Maya philosopher Schopenhauer. And this is just one example of how BTS is conveying these thoughts to their followers. Thus, the book is another important element that needs to be inserted.
The future written in… a book
With an initial print run of one million copies in America alone, but many more reprints to come, the book is a fundamental connecting point for the first 10 years of the band’s career, as well as unpublished interviews and some hints at the band’s future commitments. the seven members who announced in June 2022 that they would be taking a break after years of non-stop activity to dedicate themselves to their mental health, their respective solo projects (projects Rm, Jimin, JK, J-Hope and Jin and c) have already come out’ it’s a big wait V), and do service military, mandatory in South Korea for men. And intentionally, it aims to answer a fundamental question: what member of BTS has so captivated the world? Not a simple question, to which we have mentioned only a few answers, but extremely understandable in the heart of the Army, the first army of universal love.
