BTS has been ranked as the world’s most popular boy band ever in some accounts. In 2019, the seven-member K-pop group made $130 million in retail sales due to their money-making star power and record-breaking YouTube views and album sales. Now, who is your BTS bias?
Insider analysed BTS’s rapid rise to fame and how the band’s members have revolutionised the music industry, relying on the experience of K-pop and music industry experts and a recently published Harvard Business School case study.
In the fall of 2010, the first evidence of the BTS members’ existence emerged.
There is a chance that the Korean pop group BTS may be performing. BTS appeared on ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live in Los Angeles in 2017 as part of their tour. BTS performed on ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ in Los Angeles, California, on November 15, 2017.
They were discovered by Big Hit Entertainment, a South Korean entertainment company, in 2010 and have been managed by them since.
When it comes to acquiring new talent, entertainment organisations like Big Hit Entertainment have a broad range of alternatives at their disposal, according to a recent Harvard Business School case study that investigated the international success of BTS.
Before creating their own band, they worked as trainees for Big Hit Entertainment
Upon acceptance as a trainee, new recruits are instructed to help them become superstars. There is also training in acting and media skills in this package.
It was found that a large majority of these trainees are between the ages of 13 and 15. Big Hit Entertainment signed JungKook as a trainee when he was only 14 years old, and he made his debut just a few months shy of his 16th birthday. In his song “My Time,” which was featured in BTS’ album “Map of the Soul: 7”, released in February, he spoke about his life as a trainee to the current day.
Based on a recent case study, K-pop band training might take up to three years.
According to the case study
, K-pop artists are prepared to make their professional debuts after three years of preparation.
According to the Harvard case study
, there are around a dozen trainees for everyone who makes it to the next step. The members of BTS were selected from a pool of more than 80 applicants, including RM, Jin, Suga, Jimin, V, and Jungkook.
Bang warned the study’s participants that the concerns of “manufacturing” groups about losing their individuality are real when it comes to this tight way of talent development. “Achieve a balance between the efficacy of the method and respect for the originality of each artist,” he says, according to the study.
The “idol model” became the primary emphasis for BTS once the group shifted from its original hip-hop approach.
Conclusion
BTS was initially conceived as a hip-hop group that would primarily focus on rappers. A Harvard Business School case study explains how Bang eventually shifted its emphasis from hip-hop to the “idol model” instead. “Idol” refers to K-pop singers who combine singing and dancing in their performances, according to Korean music critic Youngdae Kim.
