10 - The BTS Phenomenon

Summary

With their Billboard chart-topping albums and sold-out stadium concerts around the globe, BTS today is the biggest success story of international K-pop. The unprecedented success of BTS challenges the understanding and study of K-pop, as it simultaneously reinforces previously existing perspectives while demanding several new ones. This chapter traces the career of BTS, surveying the historical implications of their rise to the dramatic change in the landscape of music consumption in the era of new media. Rather than depending on music industry insiders or media gatekeepers, the pop stars of the internet era form a strong and direct connection with their fans. ARMY, BTS’s global fandom, is emblematic of this change. ARMY fans do not merely buy albums or generate publicity for their stars; they open new fronts in the discourse and creative derivative work centered around BTS, further fueling the group’s worldwide success. In the US mainstream pop music market dominated by US and UK acts, these shifts in defining BTS’s success demand reconsideration of the future possibilities of Asian stars.