BTS Announce Official Hiatus, Open up About Recent Struggles

The global music sensation BTS is going on hiatus, they announced on Tuesday. According to a report by NME, the band members broke the news to die-hard fans during their annual FESTA event. They intend to “take time to explore some solo projects” and hopefully gain some fresh perspective on their work as a group at the same time.

BTS hosted a virtual FESTA dinner to mark their ninth anniversary as a band on Tuesday, but the event was bittersweet. Bandmember RM explained: “I always thought that BTS was different from other groups, but the problem with K-pop and the whole idol system is that they don’t give you time to mature. You have to keep producing music and keep doing something.” The other singers agreed, and they emphasized that they this was a difficult decision since they do not want to let their fans down.

“We can’t help but think of our fans no matter what, we want to be the kind of artists that are remembered by our fans. I think now we’re starting to think about what kind of artists we each want to be remembered by our fans,” said Jimin. “I think that’s why we’re going through a rough patch right now, we’re trying to find our identity and that’s an exhausting and long process.”

Most reports around this event now say that BTS is on hiatus, but one statement given to Pitchfork contradicts that. A spokesperson told reporters: “To be clear, they are not on hiatus but will take time to explore some solo projects at this time and remain active in various different formats.” Since the opposing statement came from the band itself, fans seem to be taking the singers’ word for it.

BTS is still promoting the release of Proof, their new compilation album comprised of some of their greatest hits over the years. It includes the new music video for “Yet to Come (The Most Beautiful Moment,)” which shows a clear visual retrospective on their meteoric rise to fame. The album has 48 tracks including all the band’s biggest songs to this point.

All seven members of BTS have released some sort of solo material already. While fans love those releases, most social media commenters were heartbroken about the news of the hiatus. Still, fans resolved to support the group in whatever endeavor they try next.