Shattering records is all in a day’s work for K-pop megastars BTS. They were the first Korean band to top the US charts and the first to headline Wembley. They even managed to guest on the worst Coldplay song of all time – 2021 gloop extravaganza My Universe – and body-pop away from the debacle with their dignity intact.
Above all, they are the face of K-pop – a genre, a phenomenon and an excuse for your children to wave expensive miniature glowsticks around. Or at least they were until Netflix’s smash-hit animated film KPop Demon Hunters stole their glory by bagging a historic Best Original Song Oscar this year.
But after a near four-year break – which they took to complete 18 months of mandatory Korean military service – Jin, Suga, J-Hope, RM, Jimin, V, and Jung Kook are back to reassert their dominance. The group marked their return with a concert in Seoul this weekend, which was live-streamed on Netflix and watched by an estimated 300 million people. They have also unleashed their first album in six years, Arirang, a maximalist record brimming with monster-truck grooves and choruses so vast and glittering you could probably detect them from outer space.