ARIRANG, or The Era of Expectations

BEFORE

BTS has gone through many eras of their career. A new one begins at midnight tonight. ARIRANG, the first post-military enlistment hiatus album, truly marks the start of a new era for the group. It’s the era of expectations, of anticipation. 

It must be so exciting and stressful right now. 

With ARIRANG, BTS isn’t just choosing to represent themselves but to represent Korean-ness to the world. The album’s title is an homage to one of Korea’s most prominent folk songs, which exists in a multitude of variants. The album’s trailer video acknowledges the first known recording of “Arirang”, by several Korean students at Howard University in 1896. 

The trailer’s featuring more white faces than black faces at an HBCU has led to a lot of upset and discourse about how history is remembered and reflected in pop culture. The conversation is ongoing as more and more people weigh in, but as I see takes from fans and experts alike, it struck me just how much it is just yet another moment of BTS's career that we as their audience are interpreting, dissecting, and reflecting on their art.

There is also a lot to talk about regarding the group's first performance in years, to be held in the heart of Seoul. There are concerns about terror attacks, leading to frustration around restricted access to the Gwanghwamun area, and simultaneously it's a major boost for tourism.

This is, of course, the point of art. Even, and perhaps especially, when that art is considered low brow or pop culture simply for the masses. It is meant to be talked about, and understood and misunderstood, and revisited again and again until it means something to the people who it resonates with the most.

We, the masses, have been taught by BTS over the years to analyze everything that they're doing, whether it's holding a flower or using a specifically impactful phrase; someone mused about the Howard and "Arirang"/ARIRANG connection months before the trailer was revealed to confirm the connection. ARMY, BTS's fans, have historically used a fine-tooth comb to explore each and every minutiae of their music, videos, content, and lives, with each era of BTS providing new data points to discover.

BTS has, in a way, made the content matter only as much as it is a tool for us to think about how we or others engage with it. Even when there is a negative reaction, there is a reaction.

I have been watching BTS' content ever since the first day of their career (I am not lucky enough to have been paying attention pre-debut, but I was a young college student who can hopefully be forgiven by her older self!) I have seen them go through all the eras of their careers: School, Youth, Wings, Love Yourself, Map of the Soul... these were all definitive album eras. Then we got the pandemic, which resulted in a weird timeline where nothing and everything felt important, resulting in comfort and enjoyment via BE and the English-language duology "Permission to Dance" and "Dynamite". PROOF was an homage to them all, and a promise ahead of their hiatus.

And now we're in the now. Still the era before, or at least a few minutes before. The era of expectations, and anticipation, and excitement, and concern over whether BTS can truly give us something else that we can enjoy, love, and dissect in a way that offers not only meaning to us but also them. BTS's albums are a story they're telling, a path they're laying out to song. And in their last official album single (in comparison to the equally meaningful, "Take Two" standalone), 2022's "Yet To Come" from PROOF, they made a promise, one that set us up for an era of years-long wait: "Yeah, the past was honestly the best/ But my best is what comes next".

What comes next is now.

AFTER

I don't often stay up until midnight for Friday music releases anymore, now that I'm not full-time covering music. But tonight, I am of course doing so.

There is anticipating coming out of every cell of mine. I wrote a literal book on BTS because I had so much about them and their art that I wanted to say, and everything that I didn't put into words then could probably fit in another five tomes. Tonight, I expect more thoughts and words will be thought and perhaps written down as I listen.

Here we go.

Okay, here we don't go.

Apple Music hates me, so I am going to watch the music video before I listen to ARIRANG because I DO NOT KNOW what the hell is flying with Apple Music right now. I have to assume it broke? I usually prefer listening to albums then watching the albums nowadays, but... It is not meant to be.

I can't believe I'm anticipating again. I have been waiting for years to listen to a new BTS album again, and finally the era of anticipation is over but it's also not.

ARIRANG is not an album I can review in one moment. My immediate reaction, whenever that ends up happening in earnest, is one I'm going to keep to myself and sleep on, and think on. I am the sort of person who listens to an album and has to listen again and again before I really absorb it, and then maybe 10 years later I'll be listening to it on a new pair of headphones, or in on a street I never walked down before, and I'll notice something new. I love noticing something new about music. The first taste of the new, however, can be confusing. Do I like this? What's this sound? Is this as good as I would like it to be? Do I understand it? Will this solidify or break a career, or make it anew? ARIRANG has all this weight and more resting on it. I do not have the words to lift that weight right now, and so will rest with it for some time. Maybe I'll share my thoughts with you once I determine where they fall, maybe I won't.

It's 12:25 and the album's finally all there. I'm clicking play. What an odd, off-kilter experience that makes it feel even more like a breath of fresh air when the first track, "Body to Body", starts playing.

I am listening to BTS's first album since 2022, and I am thinking about it. The era of anticipation is over; it's time to see what's to come in this new era.