Long live BTS. Ahead of new album Arirang, members RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jung Kook shared their hopes for the band’s future, including a desire to keep performing together well into their older years.
In a cover story interview with GQ published Friday (Feb. 13), the Bangtan Boys opened up about navigating the pressure of coming back with new music — and a world tour — after a yearslong break to pursue solo opportunities and finish their respective enlistments in the South Korean military. One way they’ve done this is by doubling down on their friendships and professional relationships with each other while working on their March 20-slated album, blocking out other distractions — something that’s given them renewed clarity about the longevity they’re striving for together.
“If we can keep this going, then maybe we can be dancing in our 60s … as long as we’re willing — I think maybe into our 50s, into our 60s — we can always be together as a band,” Suga told the publication. “Maybe it’ll be a little bit hard on our knees. But I think we can do that.”
That said, RM previously conceded that the pressure of living up to the band’s pre-military success — and following up the last full-length, 2020’s Billboard 200-topping Be — can be overwhelming. In a December livestream, the rapper told ARMY that he’d considered “thousands of times” whether it would be “better for the team to disband or go on hiatus” because of the stress.
“I think it’s RM’s love language to ARMY in a way,” Jimin told GQ of RM’s revelation. “It really shows how emotionally invested he is in the group and in ARMY as well. I think it was very RM to be vulnerable and say things like that.”
“RM is like the identity of this group,” added V. “He’s the core leader of the group, so he must feel so much more pressure than the rest of us do. I usually don’t have that much pressure, but it seems like he does.”
The guys also remember how tough it was at times to be apart from one another during their break. At a group hangout “before we all got discharged from the military service,” V remembers how Jung Kook got particularly emotional.
“He bawled,” V told the publication. “Jung Kook cried because he really wanted to be on stage, and he just really wanted to perform.”
After Arirang drops, BTS will kick off its highly anticipated world tour in April with a string of shows in Goyang, South Korea. The band will be on the road through the better part of March 2027, with stops planned in the United States, Europe, Australia, Asia and more.
In April, fans will have two opportunities to watch along live as BTS performs on stage, with simultaneous screenings of one of the concerts in Goyang and a concert in Tokyo slated to screen in theaters.
See BTS on the cover of GQ below.
This story originally appeared on Billboard
