Homecoming and Healing: BTS’s “ARIRANG” – Album Review

ARIRANG is BTS’s first studio album in four years. At the height of their fame in 2022, the group announced a hiatus in order to complete their mandatory military service: Jin enlisted in December of 2022, with the others in 2023. JungKook and Jimin were the last to serve their terms, finishing June 11^th, 2025. While BTS as individuals kept the content coming during their time away, this is the first new music as a group since Proof dropped on June 10, 2022 (although strictly speaking, Proof is not new music, but rather a compilation of their work through the years). In many ways, this album represents a homecoming and healing through the return to music and the stage.

Running at just over 41 minutes, ARIRANG consists of 14 tracks: the first five tracks are nostalgic, heavy on hip-hop and rap; Body to Body”, “Hooligan”. “Aliens”. “FYA”, “2.0”, , while the last seven SWIM” (Lead Single), “Merry Go Round”, “NORMAL”., “Like Animals”, “they don’t know ’bout us ” “. “One More Night”. “Please” and “Into the Sun” articulate the present, future-looking BTS. The two parts of the album are divided by track 6, “No. 29”; the title of which refers to The Sacred Bell of King Seongdeok (currently on display at the Gyeongju National Museum), which is known as South Korea’s National Treasure No. 29. The 1:37 minutes represent the time it takes for the sound of the bell to fade. This is used to mark a transition from the past to the present-future. The first five tracks pay homage to their origins as a hip-hop group, while the final seven move away from driving rap beats, embracing a more reflective yet dynamic exploration of the current BTS. This shift reflects their growth and evolution over time.

The album is perhaps best understood as a sustained interrogation of identity. When BTS debuted in 2013, most of the members were still teenagers; now they are approaching or over 30 and have earned the right to self-determination. ARIRANG sees BTS on an existential journey into the nature of identity without forgetting their past, as current and future identities are predicated on past selves. The project has been described as “a deeply reflective body of work that explores their identity and roots … and reflect(s) on the culmination of BTS’s journey to date”, seeking to “define the group on their own terms”. This is demonstrated by the fact that RM is credited on all tracks, SUGA across eleven tracks, j-hope ten, Jungkook four, and finally Jimin and V took part in the writing of two tracks each.

The title of the album, as well as the first track “Body to Body,” are a concerted attempt to reestablish their Koreanness and their pride in that identity. “The pop-rap track interpolates “Arirang” (a folk song which records suggest originally came from Jeongseon and these days is the unofficial national anthem of both North and South Korea) alongside Adele’s “Someone Like You” from the record-breaking album 21 (2011). Arirang is also the title of one of Korea’s earliest films, directed by Na Woon-gyu and released in 1926. While the film is an extant one, commentary on the plot directly links the folk song with national identity; audiences of the time would sing the song at the film’s conclusion. The huge success of BTS’s three English-language songs “Dynamite” (2020), “Butter” (2021) and “Permission to Dance” (2021) had critics and fans at the time lamenting BTS’s perceived loss of identity. For some, this seemed a betrayal; as many of BTS’s original fans were drawn to the group, partly because of its Koreanness. An insightful piece by David Tizzard for The Korea Times asks what happens ‘When the K Disappears” (2023). Provocatively, he suggests that if the “K” vanishes, Korean culture will finally come of age. But as we have seen K-Pop’s koreanness remains an important part of the genre, and one that is clear to see for BTS. In a global world, identities are in flux, shifting along with physical and psychological borders within liquid modernity. Yet we still cling to those things that define us in terms of belongingness and community; the past mediating between our present and future selves. This is clearly shown in “Body To Body” as the driving rap gives way to choral Arirang. By the commingling of the old and the new, the local and the global, BTS stress their commitment to Korea alongside recognising the liminal nature of their identities within the global economy.

ARIRANG sees BTS taking risks rather than just repeating what they did in the past. There is an emphasis on alternative and experimental pop and rap throughout, which is particularly seen in the first half of the album, where they are reworking their past and, through it, taking agency and accountability. Track 23: “Hooligan” clearly demonstrates this, effortlessly blending rap with strings and drums, seemingly addressing Tizzard’s question about the “K”: “Yeah, we the mess, gonna get a bigger mop here (Bigger mop) / This that K, gotta get a better pop here (Better pop) / You gon’ hear this one playin’ ’round the clock, yeah (‘Round the clock) /’Round the clock, clock, clock, clock.”

This is followed by “Aliens”, in which the group once again addresses accusations of not being Korean enough; “Clap your hands and shake your body to the jungmori rhythm”. Jungmori jangdan is comprised of a 12 beat measure, unlike Western music in which “basic rhythm flows like “one two three, two two three”” . Linguistically, “Jung” means not too slow or fast, and centred in the middle while “mori” means to “drive” something forward. While the tempo may be different, stress is on the “first beat and the ninth beat’ (KBS World: 2011). The song also names Kim Gu (1876-1962), President of Korea (1933-1953), the last president of a united Korea before it was split into North and South along the DMZ by the Korean Armistice Agreement in 1953, bringing the Korean War to an end. Since the group’s debut, BTS have been situated on the margins through the process of othering, partly because they came from a small agency and also because the early work was highly critical of Korean society and the competitive nature of the education system. In addition, there was frequent misgendering in Western commentary alongside invasive questioning of sexuality with little awareness of context. “Aliens” directly addresses such processes and stereotypes: “How are you so shameless / 예의를 차려we aliens /We care about good manners, we aliens/ 해는 동쪽에서 risin’ / In the East, the sun risin’ / Aliens, aliens”. The word “Alien” has historically been used as an umbrella term for those who are perceived as pejoratively other regarding their nationality, race, gender, sexual orientation, or anything else outside of an arbitrarily designated “normal” (Nate Wooley: 2022). The title of the track “Aliens” responds to constructions of otherness, as well as foregrounding the dialectics of exclusion and oppression, challenging power dynamics and citational practices through which race and gender are constituted through performative acts and linguistic terminology. According to Sara Ahmed (2013) citation is “a rather successful reproductive technology, a way of reproducing the world around certain bodies” (2013).

JPEGMAFIA (Barrington DeVaughn Hendricks) is one of the producers on the next track “FYA”. Known for his experimental hip-hop, JPEGMAFIA’s lyrics often confront systemic racism and the political ideologies behind it. Importantly, JPEGMAFIA presents as non-conforming to gender binaries and associated roles, confronting ideals of masculinity through deconstructing stereotyping and fetishisation of the black body. Further, their music often encapsulates the commingling of the human and the non-human, for example, “Grimy Waifu” (2019). “FYA” can be seen as a reworking of “Fire” (2016): “Everything lit, it’s fire / Everything big, it’s fire / Everything lit, it’s fire / Everything big, it’s fire”. The lyrics name-check Britney Spears and Michael Jackson: “Club go psycho / Might take you viral / I go full Thriller tonight/ Club go crazy / Like Britney, baby / Hit me with it one more time”. No longer teenagers on the cusp of adulthood, BTS embrace the future while signalling its indebtedness to the past.

This offers a clear transition to “2.0” which brings the first section of the album to a close: “Light the fire, brand new, light it, brand new / Yeah, we on that brand new, you know how we do”. Here, BTS are naming and reclaiming their identities. And it is significant that this is a song that ends the first half of the album. Just as the first half has talked about the past, or what is known as chapter 1, the second half of the album engages with the present and the future, BTS’s ‘chapter 2’.

In the second half, we can glimpse the future BTS through its relationship to the past BTS. The search for identity is evident in the lead single “SWIM” and the accompanying music video, which subtly references the Ship of Theseus paradox. This paradox is a thought experiment that relates to the shifting nature of identity over time. Using the ship as a metaphor for the self and ruminating on the replacement of parts of the ship due to wear and tear, the Greek philosopher Plutarch posed the question as to whether the final ship was still the same if all parts were new. Later, Thomas Hobbes added to the paradox by posing the question as to whether the original planks were used to build a second boat, which one would be the “original”.

Most cultures across the world have variations on this thought experiment: France, “Jeannot’s knife”, Hungary, “Lajos Kossuth’s pocket knife”, and in the US, “George Washington’s Ax”, to name but a few. On the surface, the lyrics for “SWIM” seem to directly engage with parasocial relations between artists and fans: “Swim, swim / Water falling off your skin /Swim, swim / I could spend a lifetime watching you / Swim (Swim), swim (Swim) / Let it all begin / Swim, swim / I just wanna dive, I just wanna dive”. It could also be argued that “SWIM’ reflects on the past in that it shares themes with an earlier hidden track called “SEA” from Love Yourself 承 ‘Her’ (2017). And whereas “SEA” expressed worry and fear about the future, ‘SWIM’ is more hopeful. It is not that the journey has finished, but rather that BTS has moved beyond childish fears to a place of adult acceptance. After all, a ship protects us from the raging currents of a stormy sea.

The next track “Merry-Go-Round” discusses the vagaries of BTS’s global success and concomitant fame. Once again, ARIRANG acknowledges the importance of the past in the construction of the present and future selves. The Merry-Go-Round is a central piece of set design in their music video for their record-breaking “Spring Day” (2017), as well as the place where j-hope is abandoned in the BTS Universe (BU). It is one of the most powerful songs on the album. RM’s verse, which concludes the song, uses references to the end of life/time, entreating us to enjoy the ride while we can: “My bed is my coffin /My bed is my coffin / Maybe my whole world’s just one big caffeine / Every day I go to die by you /Can’t I just switch off this dream? / ‘Cause I’m doing a dance I can’t stop / Again, thoughts on thoughts on thoughts on thoughts / I’m thinking about how to stop thinking / Spinning and spinning, are you happy? / Keep smiling ’til it’s over”.

This theme of alienation and abandonment is continued in “NORMAL,” which fuses pop and rock and explores the intersection between solitude and the spotlight. In The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1956), Erving Goffman contended that life was like a never-ending play in which we take on different roles depending on our circumstances. He distinguishes between front stage and backstage; front stage refers to what roles we play when we are with the company, while backstage, we don’t have to play our parts but can be our authentic selves outside of the curious gaze of others. We can also spend our time backstage preparing to go front stage: “Kerosene, dopamine, chemical-induced / Fantasy and fame, yeah, the things we choose / Show me hate, show me love, make me bulletproof / Yeah, we call this shit normal (Woo-woo) / Run away, out of sight, don’t know what / want / Wish I had a minute just to turn me off Kerosene, dopamine, what I gotta do? / Yeah, we call this shit normal (Ah-ooh)”. Indeed, what is normal must be very different for people who live in the public eye, especially in terms of idols from the Korean system, as the promotion schedule when you are establishing yourself is brutal, and the eyes of the world are on you, with any little indiscretion being blown out of proportion. “NORMAL Indeed, what is normal must be very different for people who live in the public eye, especially in terms of idols from the Korean system as the promotion schedule when you are establishing yourself is brutal, and the eyes of the world are on you, with any little indiscretion being blown out of proportion. “NORMAL” directly addresses the conflict between the private and public selves, which lies at the heart of the album.

“Like Animals” obliquely references Def Leppard’s “Animal” (1987), both anthemic tracks which address the mechanics of desire and lust as animality. In queer theory, animality is often used to refer to the boundaries of the human, abject (the abject is that which the subject rejects to take their place in the symbolic; best signified by the corpse, the final boundary, whose materiality we deny until facing it ourselves), and the queer (Lucy Bollington, 2017). The well-known Freudian analogy is that desire is regulated through the taming of the ID by the Super-ego: “if you wanna be animals / Baby, we can be animals / Eat this life ’til your heart is full (‘Til your heart is full) / If you want, you can have it all (You can have it all, oh)”.

The penultimate track, “they don’t know ’bout us ” centres on their rise to global stardom and the reasons for their success as BTS were arguably the group that paved the way for K-pop in the West. At the same time, in the media spotlight has been intolerably cruel at times led to many conversations about the group not continuing: “They keep asking just what was so different / I answer, I don’t know either / Everybody hears the story that they wanna / They popped off ’cause of this one thing, I’m for sure / We just big boys, a.k.a. country kids / Just riding the wave, just shut up, shut up, oh”.

The final track, “Into the Sun,” articulates concern about the fickle nature of fame. The lyrics: “I’ll follow you into the sun / Into the sun, into the sun” reference another Greek myth, that of Icarus, who didn’t heed Daedalus’s injunction against flying too low or high. Instead of exploring his newfound freedom after being locked up in a tower, Icarus soared too close to the sun, plummeting to his death. The multiple references to Greek mythology form part of the album’s mediation on the nature of identity centered on the transition from childhood to adulthood under the watchful eye of the world’s press and with the hopes of a nation resting heavily on you.

ARIRANG is BTS’s most authentic album yet. They continue to experiment by working with different artists and producers outside of the mainstream. Here BTS worked with El -Guincho and Fakeguido on “Hooligan”, Will Made-lt and Pluss on “2.0” and JPEGMafia on “FYA” In the final analysis, ARIRANG is an album with no skips; it is about the past, present and future and the nebulous nature of identity. BTS reclaim their heritage by addressing questions around Koreanness as well as appropriate masculinity. The past operates as traumatic repetition mapping the personal to the societal; South Korea was born from trauma – the Japanese occupation, the Korean War, the Gwangju uprising, the SEWOL ferry disaster – leading to intergenerational and transgenerational hauntings. Through their art, BTS offers a philosophical mediation on the nature of identity at a time of flux, warning us not to get too close to the sun in case our wings get burnt like Icarus.

ARIRANG is BTS‘s most accomplished album to date. It is true to who they were, who they are and who they will be. This is BTS’s announcement to the world, they are back and mean business, and remain the best.

Rating:

Written by Dr Colette Balmain

_{View of the Arts is an online publication dedicated to film, music, and the arts, with a strong focus on the Asian entertainment industry. As we continue to grow, we aim to deepen our coverage of Asian music while remaining committed to exploring and celebrating creativity across the global arts landscape.}