BTS are one of the superstar groups of the phenomenon that is known as Korean pop or K-pop, and have held that place since they appeared in 2013, along with a handful of bands such as BigBang, Shinee, B.A.P., EXO and 4Minute. To longtime K-pop fans, BTS’ first entered the US mainstream with the hit, ‘Idol‘ featuring Nicki Minaj amidst a barrage of profile-raising publicity, which came as a surprise, as did BTS’ general American and global success. Given that BTS and K-pop had been such a deeply Korean musical and pop cultural experience until then, although popular in several other countries around the world.

This represents major change in worldwide pop music trends and a long-awaited cultural evolution K-pop bands thought it deserved, since they knew it was so good. To South Korean pop fans and those in the know elsewhere in theShot backstage before the world tour, BTS world, K-pop has been one of, if not the most vital and dynamic pop music forces in the world today, a treasure trove of colour, imagination, seemingly inexhaustible joyful exuberance, creativity and suprisingly impressive musical and songwriting talent. But to the likes of the US and Australia, K-pop has only been a strictly subcultural and underground phenomenon – until now.

Not including of course the novelty success of PSY in 2012 with ‘Gangnam Style‘ and its “horsey dance”, which was nice to have as an introduction of K-pop to the world, but not indicative of the vast bulk of K-pop, which is more musically sophisticated generally. The international rise of BTS in 2018 represented the first time a K-pop band of real quality made it big and crashed through into the English-speaking mainstream, although K-pop royalty the excellent BigBang, came very close in 2016-17.

BTS reached number 11 in the US in 2018 with ‘Idol’ and number 10 with the beautiful ‘Fake Love‘. The album from which they came, ‘Love Yourself: Answer‘, reached number 1 in the US and along with ‘Love Yourself: Her‘ and latest album ‘Map Of The Soul: Persona‘, BTS have joined only four other musical acts in US history to have three number one albums in two years, alongside such acts as the Beatles, were the number two musical act in the world sales-wise in 2018 and number 3 in America, a true first for any kind of Asian pop. And it also confirmed one other thing: BTS had arrived.

BTS started off with a fairly heavy, aggressive rap sound with the release of their first single, ‘No More Dream‘ in 2013, which is nevertheless a catchy enough song to be accessible. While they continued with several heavy hip hop songs on their subsequent albums, BTS quickly branched out into beautifully lush, epic pop songs such as ‘Run‘, ‘I Need U‘, ‘Blood, Sweat and Tears‘ and ‘DNA‘ before the appearance of current album, ‘Map Of The Soul: Persona‘, which became the first Korean album to reach number one on both the UK and Australian charts.

And sure enough, the album begins with an aggressive hip hop track, ‘Intro – Persona‘, soon moves into the sweet pop melodies of ‘Boy With Luv‘, featuring American female singer Halsey. With the appearance of interestingly Greek-titled song names, ‘Mikrokosmos‘ is a relatively unremarkable, straight-ahead pop song, whereas closer ‘Dionysus‘ is a classic BTS banger mixing electronic, dance and a little bit, but not too much of rap. Other highlights are ‘Home‘ and ‘Jamais Vu‘, complete with all the BTS highlights of epic emotion, warmth and sentimentality. Welcome to the world of BTS – as international pop stars.