150429 ‘BLOOMING YOUTH’ AS DESCRIBED BY BTS

[ethereal]

 

This album shows the growth of BTS maturing from boys to seven men. The past albums showcased the dreams, happiness, and love harbored by teens in a â€œthree-part school series.†Having graduated from this series, BTS is stepping one foot closer to â€˜youth.’ In unraveling their stories of youth, their musicality spectrum has also broadened with the vocal line joining the rapper line in song compositions also. 

Having shown their growth through ‘Blooming Youth,’ we wonder what BTS thinks in spending their youth in this ambivalent moment of beauty and anxiousness. Also, due to his school exams, the youngest member Jungkook could not participate in this interview. 

 

Q: How do you feel about your comeback?

J-Hope: It’s been 8 months since we were on hiatus and the anticipation is very high. Because it’s been a while since we’ve had our comeback, we’re nervous and excited in thinking of meeting with our fans. We’ve worked hard and are confident that we’ll work harder haha.

 

Q: All of the members lost weight and got more handsome. Is there a certain member who’s â€œrisen†to the visual title with this round of promotions?

J-Hope: I personally think it’s Suga hyung. He lost a lot of weight and suits this concept the best. He’s pure and innocent…

Jimin: I think the youngest Jungkook. He’s handsome the more you look at him!

 

Q: Could we request a description of this album?

Rap Monster: The title of this album is called â€˜Blooming Youth Part I.’ Having ended our â€˜three-part school series,’ they say there’s two parts to your youth, so this is first part we created. The title derives from a movie that’s also called â€˜Blooming Youth’ and it defines as your most beautiful moment, to which we thought that the most beautiful part to life is your youth. There are a lot of people who reminisce on their youth and as those who are currently in their youth, we decided to create an album in regards to it.

 

Q: The title â€˜Blooming Youth’ sounds somewhat mystical. 

Rap Monster: Whenever I hear about people describing their most beautiful moment in life, I think â€˜youth’ defines itself as the answer. Although people can’t define youth exactly, I think it’s something people tend to miss a lot and find beautiful. This is shown through the many poems out there regarding youth. Rather than using the term youth, we thought it would be better to describe it more eloquently and this term (blooming youth) had a nice ring to it. 

 

Q: We saw that during the â€˜MAMA’ performance last year, â€˜Blooming Youth’ was tattooed on Jimin. Was it foreshadowing a comeback?

Jimin: Yes. It was decided then. Although there was nothing elaborately planned then, we were in the works of discussing the release of an album.

 

Q: We’re curious as to when the â€˜Blooming Youth’ was for the members of BTS.

Suga: Hrm… I don’t think the beautiful moment has come for me yet. We also titled the album â€˜Blooming Youth’ in hopes for a beautiful moment to approach us. We hope to see some light through this round of promotions hehe.

J-Hope: We hope that both us and our fans can all encounter â€˜Blooming Youth.’

 

 

Q: What kind of song is your title track â€˜I Need U’?

Rap Monster: The melody is clear and it’s an emotional track. There’s flute sounds included also. First off, looking at the lyrics, it shows the sadness of someone trying to hold onto a love that has already ended on basic conversational words. Honestly, the reason why we chose this as our title track was because although youth can be beautiful, it can be short and wander off; like a shadow, it has a reckless danger to it. Rather than focusing on the beautiful aspect of youth, we wanted to shine the light on the dimmer and overshadowed parts. Although it describes a love story between youth, it has lyrics that can describe the risks also. 

 

Q: Then do you think youth and love are similar?

Rap Monster: I think youth and love have a lot of commonalities. Youth can suddenly end without you realizing it, and this applies for love as well. In the heat of the moment, you think that this is going to last forever but it’s bound to wilt away. I think there’s a point where the two (love and youth) meet. This is why we decided to have â€˜I Need U’ as our title track for â€˜Blooming Youth.’

J-Hope: When I first heard the beat, it sounded refreshing. It stirred emotions and the â€˜bang bang bang bang’ part was fresh. It was fun while working on it.

Jin: Our last album was performance-driven since we had to portray a strong image but I found this one more comfortable since the choreography was more catered for listening. 

 

Q: Is there a highlight in the choreography for your title track?

V: It’s my part haha. Because there’s not much to it. I say â€œI love you†and it’s my first time saying it after debut so I feel like I’m saying it sincerely. So I hope you look out for my part. 

J-Hope: The choreography is very BTS-like but has a slight soft side to it also. A sensual side hehe. I think you can see a different side to BTS with this title track. The overall picture and choreography depict the song’s emotions spot-on so you’ll have fun watching it also. The part â€œwhoooa†will stir you up.

Jimin: Rather than looking out for a highlight of the choreography, I hope you look at us overall haha. 

 

Q: We’re curious about the other tracks on the album also. 

Suga: The album consists of nine tracks in total. We composed the album of what we thought would be the worries, dilemmas, and thoughts of youth our age. All of the tracks express the common worries and fear that our generation has. I think people outside of our age group who have the same worries can relate to the lyrics also. 

 

Q: The album photos were released prior to the album release and it was a very new look. Were there any anecdotes from the photo shooting?

Jimin: We went to the Kyungnam area for 1 night and 2 days. The scenery was really pretty and I felt like I was on a picnic so I had a good time shooting. 

J-Hope: I thought it would be warm with flowers blooming but the weather was actually cold. We had to climb a tree as a part of the photo shoot and I was scared. Because I get scared easily, I ended up getting scared and froze. (Was it due to your fear as a youth? Haha) Huh? You could see it that way. Sadness resulted from fear haha. 

 

Q: In the past, you’ve had masculine concepts so was it awkward with this new concept?

Jin: I think because we’ve shown a masculine concept so much, we tried really hard for this concept. We worked on not having such a hard gaze, which was really difficult for me since after â€˜Boy in Luv,’ I’ve always had such a piercing gaze. During the filming, I was asked to soften up my gaze. 

Suga: I think the photos turned out nice this time. We had fun that day shooting so I think that’s how we earned good results. 

Jimin: Because we used a film camera, we were worried about not being able to monitor our photos on set but the scenery was really pretty.

 

Q: It must have felt like being on vacation with the members.

Jin: It was like being at an MT (membership training). On our first day of filming, I wanted to eat Youngdeok snow crabs but there was no place open so I satisfied my cravings with snacks.

Jimin: But we were about to eat Kyungju bread from Kyungju and kimchi stew. We also ate the specialty foods of that area. 

 

Q: We’re curious about the meaning behind your music video also.

Rap Monster: If you look at our album photos, there are some photos that are beautiful like cherry blossoms but there are sadder versions also. I think it tells a story of one’s unhappiness. You can be unhappy but still feel happy when with others. With the toss between these two emotions, you can look at is as a cross of emotions where beauty and anxiety coincide together. The music video has more of a depressing youth aura.

 

Q: In this album, the members of the vocal line (Jin, Jimin, V, and Jungkook) all got their names in the credits for producing and composing lyrics. 

Jimin: It was thanks to V and Jungkook.

V: I helped write and compose for the track â€˜Hold Me.’ I grew up on onlooking the rapper line compose and found it fun so I started off with the instrumentals that established artists have used. While working on this album, the producer reached out to me to produce together so I was lucky that this was made it onto the album. 

 

Q: Was there any advice that producer Bang Shi Hyuk gave you for your upcoming promotions?

Jin: He said the choreography would be easy but he lied haha. It was easy at first but then it got harder and harder.

V: And soon enough, a choreography that rivaled â€˜Danger’ was born.

Suga: There were a lot of revisions in the choreography so we had to remember a lot, which was difficult. 

J-Hope: We would sleep on a choreography and wake up the next morning of having it completely changed.

Jin: But these guys can remember it in a day. Not for me. While practicing the revised choreography, I would have a mental breakdown if there was another revision. 

 

Q: Is there anything you want to promise if you win 1st place for this round of promotions?

Rap Monster: 1st place… if we place first on a music program, we’ll rent out a movie theater room to watch a movie with our fans.

J-Hope: Rather than watch a trending movie, why not watch a non-trending movie? Haha.

Suga: How about switching parts between the vocal line and rapper line in the encore stage!

 

Q: What can you expect from this round of promotions?

Suga: I hope that it’ll be a beautiful and shining moment.

V: I hope it can be a legendary round of promotions. I hope there will be people who will say â€˜I Need U.’

 

Q: If you can say a word to the fans who waited for you.

Jin: We’ve come back after a hiatus. We hope that both us and the fans can have a â€˜Blooming Youth.’

Suga: We hope that you have no regrets with how long you’ve waited and we’re expecting to have fun while promoting. You can think of it as you’re promoting with us and I hope we can be together. 

V: I’m happy to see our fans after such a long time.

Jimin: We hope that this can be a memorable era for how long you’ve waited for it.

J-Hope: We’ll always be with you whenever. From the official fan cafe to post on the cafe and Twitter with mentions - we’re checking them all. I’m happy. I hope you anticipate our comeback a lot and that this era can truly be a â€˜Blooming Youth.’

Rap Monster: Every time I listen to â€˜Blooming Youth,’ I think of how it sounds like the name of a flower. I hope that us and the fans can blossom to a full bloom like a daffodil.

 

CREDITS: 10ASIA (SOURCE); Wonnie @ bts-trans (TRANS)

[hotdog]

I can't wait for the choreography!!!!!!!

[aeon*]

The more I hear about the choreography, the more I want to see it.

[littlemaru]

    I hope the cameras later do justice to their performance

[elitin]

    I hope the cameras later do justice to their performance

I hope so too, but we can always count on MPDnim for a fancam if that's not the case ;)

[aera]

The more I hear about the choreography, the more I want to see it.

[mejinki]

They've done so well with this comeback, I absolutely love everything about it ;-;

 

Also hyped for their performance! *o*