Los Angeles has purple once more. Having arrived for four consecutive sold-out nights within the ARIRANG world tour, BTS have performed their first full concert series in the city since all seven members fulfilled their obligatory military service. The run of September 1 2 5 and 6 has been a celebration of their return as a group as well as another milestone for the seven members, who dedicated the best part of the last few years to their country and the preparation of this worldwide comeback.
The response from the city came in the form of official recognition. Los Angeles announced September 1 8 as “BTS Week” and lit up the front of City Hall in the deep, neon red-tone reflecting the group’s latest album, “Map of the Soul.” Mayor Karen Bass and Los Angeles city officials issued a proclamation thanking the Korean group for “their major influence on the worldwide culture, positively uniting the masses through their evocative music and inspiring message.
” For all the fans who came from all over the country and the world, the recognition felt like a homecoming. The concerts mark the end of the North American part of a tour which has already taken in scores of venues and will proceed into central and South America, Asia and Australia until 2027. The ARIRANG tour takes its name from a traditional Korean folk song which is often linked with sadness, escaping from difficult circumstances, and return home, themes which will now hit home after the long layoff. When the six members last shared a stage at SoFi in late 2021 during the Permission to Dance on Stage tour, they were planning separate military drafts. Now they return as a group, a step back from solo ventures which seem a lifetime ago, older, and carrying the collective burden of military service. Tickets sold out in hours after release earlier this year.
The only options now are to buy a scalped ticket, a routine occurrence for any BTS stadium date. Fans buy up hotel rooms and pack local restaurants and streets with light sticks, banners and matching outfits. anticipation mingles with joyful relief outside the stadium before a show: at last, their boys are truly back.
The performances themselves are hoped to feature new material from the album as well as the catalogue that catapulted BTS into global superstardom. The scale of the performance is massive, plainly designed to fill stadiums, but that does not matter; after all it is the bonding between the members and the fans that have supported through so much that makes up the heart of any BTS gig; for a number of fans, the tour represents more than that, and it is theorized that it is this that accounts for the crazed reactions: for some it is the fruition of their long-standing wait, and for others a celebration of perseverance, theirs and the groups. For BTS, this has always been about more than hit records.
The band itself has vocalized over and over again themes of mental health, self-empowerment and community. Such messages can transcend linguistic borders. That may be part of the reason for the diverse cross-section of fans who turned out at the L.A. show. The city’s recognition marks Bts’s incorporation into the cultural fabric rather than just brief intrusion into it.
