BTS’s Jung Kook has become the first artist from the K-pop band to feature at No 1 on Billboard Global Charts.
In December 2021, BTS’s label Big Hit Music announced that the group will go on an “extended period of rest”.
Since then, BTS band members have been releasing music as solo artists.
This week, Billboard announced that Jung Kook and Latto’s new single “Seven” has reached No 1 on both the Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl US charts.
According to the music industry magazine, this makes the singer a leader on the list for a member of BTS as a soloist.
The Global 200 and Global Excl US charts “rank songs based on streaming and sales activity culled from more than 200 territories around the world”, as compiled by Luminate.
Jung Kook’s “Seven” racked up over 217 million streams and 269,000 downloads ever since its release on 14 July through 20 July.
The song’s streaming activity narrowly outperformed Miley Cyrus’s hit track “Flowers”.
— (AFP via Getty Images)
In 2022, the entertainment company behind BTS clarified the group’s “hiatus” news.
“BTS are not taking a hiatus. Members will be focusing more on solo projects at this time,” South Korean entertainment company Hybe wrote in a statement.
BTS band members also talked about their future in a separate video.
In the clip, BTS members – J-Hope, RM, Suga, Jung Kook, V, Jin, and Jimin – each opened up about the struggle to develop as individual artists within the K-pop genre. They also discussed having to deal with the pandemic interrupting their touring plans and music releases.
RM said that the group had “definitely changed” in recent years, and that the band members “didn’t know what kind of group we were anymore.”
V recalled a conversation he had with J-Hope, in which they discussed how working on solo projects would improve their “synergy” as a band.
Towards the end, in a message of hope for their loyal BTS Army (as the group’s fans are collectively known), Jung Kook said: “We promise we will return someday even more mature than we are now.”
Additional reporting from agencies
