Flexing the fandom self

It's June, which means it's the most wonderful time of year for BTS's ARMY: Festa, aka the annual celebration of the group's anniversary. Every year, the act has put out new and old content, streaming concerts, releasing special songs and concerts, commemorating each new year with ARMY. J-hope will be hosting a concert series in Seoul as part of this year's celebration; I saw him during his New York leg, and it was such a phenomenal concert.

This year, of course, means even more: June marks the return of all BTS members back to civilian life, following the seven men gradually circulating through South Korea's armed forces to fulfill the country's mandatory draft (due to technically still being war with North Korea as the Korean War has never officially ended.) Currently, Jin and J-Hope are already active, finishing first, and between June 10-21, RM, V, Jimin, Jungkook, and Suga will also return. This is the long-awaited return after their 2022 announcement of a break (which spiralled out of control...)

There's a lot of rumors circulating regarding BTS's return, though most people are expecting not only solo albums from members, but also a united group album and a tour in the near future (meaning late 2025 or in 2026).

All of this is to say, the fandom fervor is at an all-time high of anticipation, waiting for the long-awaited return. Yours truly is similarly sitting here eagerly in anticipation, waiting for the return of the kings (and laughing at the current duo's hilarious news broadcast.)

I always knew 2025 would be when BTS returned, we all did; but, to be honest, I didn't expect the anticipation on my behalf. This is the first time in a decade when BTS's return means I don't have to churn out daily news coverage of their return, and I can just enjoy.

Enjoying being a fan, that's something I've struggled with over the years.

In 2026, I've revelled in enjoying it: I've chased after the concerts I've wanted to see in the US, and not pitched coverage of each one to editors. I've listened to albums without sitting their ideating why this is or is not the album of the year. I've done those things too, and have regretted not doing them more, but this has been a year for me just to enjoy.

Enjoying, I think, is something I've never done when I worked as a full-time journalist, even though it always has been the goal. How can one cover entertainment without enjoying it? It's oxymoronic, but at the same time, work, no matter how enjoyable, is ultimately work.

But struggling with that relationship between work and enjoyment of it was always something I wanted to do: my phone lockscreen is often a picture of some stylized calligraphy a fan had drawn of a quote DK of Seventeen once shared with me in an interview for Forbes, saying in response to a question about their hard work, that "You can’t beat a person who enjoys, so we’ll continue enjoying everything. We’re a group that works hard while enjoying everything."

There's something truly beautiful about aspiring to work hard and still be able to enjoy the process for all it is.

But I never could find the balance: I spent much of my career stressed, making mistakes, covering things in ways I now look back on and question, and wonder why I always had such a stick up my ass. Some of it was the me of the past decade; some of it was my perception of how hard it is to be a woman in entertainment journalism, particularly music journalism. I still remember the pain, and perhaps trauma, of a man running a major K-pop event yelling at me publicly in front of other reporters because I was insisting on him providing the interview I had been sent to get.

I am embarrassed, now, in how poorly I reacted by just letting that man say his piece to me without saying anything back, and how I sent my poor editor a really pathetically detailed email about how badly things went that day (long story short: I was approved for my first very big interview, set up in the interview room, and the event coordinator had either lied to me or forgot to get approval from the artists themselves to do said interview. It was frustrating, and mortifying after he chewed me out publicly.

At the time, I said nothing publicly; it felt like I'd be the one blacklisted if I spoke out, labeled a difficult woman to work with. It set the bar a bit, for my career; there were many times where I didn't push back when I should of, and times when it felt like I didn't speak out when it was worthwhile to call out wrongs.

The stress of balancing the fun and hard work of covering K-pop and my own feelings of ineptitude made for some very, very dark years.

Which is why I'm so happy that 2025 has been, for all the other shit going on in the world, a good year for me personally to enjoy being a fan. To some degree, I feel like I've failed as a journalist; I no longer write regularly beyond this newsletter, and this newsletter is increasingly less industry oriented than I'd like it. I now work in tech, and don't know if I'll ever work fulltime in journalism again. It's hard to reckon with personally, and even now as I type I feel bangs of heartbreak typing those words.

But by leaving a failing industry, I've given myself some room to enjoy again. Taking a step back, I've done things this year I would have never, ever allowed myself to do before, including going barricade with friends at a concert for the first time, for NCT 127's show in San Antonio. I dressed up for a concert for the first time, and made aoster for my bias, and also found out that posters of a certain size are not allowed to be in pits.

I have seen dozens, if not over 100, K-pop acts, and I had never known that before. It was something so basic from the fan experience, but I, in my division of fandom and professional self, had never experienced it.

I also experienced watching my bias blow kisses to one of my friends, while I realized, "Holy shit, why isn't he looking at me?" and simultaneously "Oh, this is why fans pay so much for fan interactions. Weird." I felt seen and engaged with in a way I didn't really understand. I thought I had. I was wrong.

It was a moment of frustration — I wanted to feel that affection too! — and understanding. This is why people spend months preparing for concert, why people run group orders to speak to their favorite star. I had interviewed my favorite stars; I had clinically analyzed their careers and music. And somewhere along the way, I forgot how to just enjoy.

Now I'm enjoying again, and smiling as I write that.

This isn't my proclamation of the end of my professional self and total affirmation of Fan. I'm still not telling you who my bias in NCT 127 that I was jealous of my friend of of you know my BTS or Seventeen ones are either. It feels unprofessional for me to do so, shouting my loves out there for everyone to hold against me in the future, whether from the industry side of things, the sexist side of things, or the fandom-fueled bias accusation side of things. I'm keeping my loves close to me, because they're precious. And I'm going to keep covering and writing about them because they're precious, and try to think of ways to do so more thoughtfully, and better than ever.

I've written about this sort of thing a few times this year, but I didn't really realize I was thinking about it so extremely personally until a few weeks ago. I'm gonna try to get back on track and fulfill some of my plans for Notes on K-pop and other writing ideas, in 2025, but, as with concerts and Festa, and being a fan, I'm going to aim to keep enjoying this little thing that I love for myself amid the rest of the world's chaos and despair. And I hope you are too!

What I'm listening to

I wrote this newsletter listening to Enhypen's new album, Desire : Unleash, fronted by the single "Bad Desire (With or Without You)". There's a good splash of Timbaland-Justin Timberlake mid 2000s-early 2010s inspo here, so I think we can confirm that the Y2K nostalgia is aging a bit and we're approaching the early aughts.

A friend referred me to Just B's "Chest" recently and I've been obsessed. If you've read my work for a while, you may know that I'm absolute TRASH for a good synth-forward electropop dance track, and this is the best thing I've heard in ages.

In that vein... While not K-pop, f5ve's Sequence 01 is one of my favorite albums this year so far. It features some earlier releases, and last year's "Underground" really won its way in my heart. I was doing some reading on it, and really enjoyed Random J's great writeup.

What I'm reading

I was just reading this article about digital archiving, and thinking about it in the context of Soompi closing its forums.

In the news... There's a lot of financial news that I honestly should have covered in-depth but didn't because I'll be writing an H1 scorecard in a few weeks. For now, some reading:

"Tencent Music to become second-largest shareholder in K-pop agency SM Entertainment "(Reuters) just as "K-pop has been banned in China for almost a decade. Until now, maybe." (NBC News) This comes as "South Korea's new president Lee Jae-myung pledges to 'unite' country" (BBC), even if "Stars don't shine intentionally as they turn out to vote in muted color palettes" (Korea JoongAng Daily) especially after "[aespa's] Karina sparks political debate over social media post" (Yonhap).

As if that isn't a lot to tackle, "NewJeans Members to Be Fined $734,000 Each for Unauthorized Activities, Korean Court Rules" (Billboard) and "South Korea financial watchdog reportedly plans to refer HYBE’s Bang Si-hyuk to prosecutors over alleged IPO fraud" ( Music Business Worldwide).

And, locally for NYC, "K-Pop music label [Hello82] to open East Coast fan space in Manhattan" (CoStar).