对于BTS及其军队来说，这是一个重要的一周。周三，乐队收到了它的第一个格莱美提名for their smash hit “Dynamite”, which is a goal they’ve been talking about for years. Their new album,是，他们的2020年第二次发行，上周五发行，预计将挑战专辑排行榜的顶级。
是，as RM, Jin, Suga, j-hope, Jimin, V, and Jungkook have said, is an album that could only have happened during the pandemic. This is BTS singing about their uncertainty, about their frustrations, and sharing in the loneliness and fear that so many people around the world have experienced this year. It is also, however, an album about grounding yourself in what’s real and what can never be broken – friendship, connection, and the empathy that is borne from that combination. This is what BTS constantly tries to find and then transmit.
我爱这张专辑,也许因为它的at a time – like exactly on the day – when it was announced where I live that we’d be heading back into lockdown and I don’t know when I’ll be able to see my parents and I miss my friends so much so the songs went straight to the soul and stayed there. But even though是is for the heart, BTS is also on this album flexing their musicality. And, for me, no song illustrates that more than “Dis-ease”, led by j-hope. The title is a clever play, hitting on both the pandemic but on how COVID has not only threatened us physically but emotionally. It’s made us vulnerable biologically but it’s also eroded our trust: in information, in leadership, in what was “normal”, in each other, in ourselves – all that wrapped up in a track that’s funky and retro, a song you could totally party to… which adds another layer to its meaning. That’s the imbalance of it, right? What you’re hearing sounds so fun but what they’re actually saying is unsettling. That is the unease of “Dis-ease”. It’s the best song on an album full of very good songs.
我确实有投诉。这不一定是批评，更多的是粉丝的遗憾：有几条单位曲目是that are so great, I can’t wait to hear them live… except when they’re in concert (whenever they go on tour again), there’s only so much time available and it’s not possible between their already extensive catalogue, and their own solo songs, to fit in enough of the units. “Fly To My Room”, for example, is suuuuuch a cute, fresh sound for BTS that it would suck not to be able to hear them deliver it in a stadium. But the song that this applies to the most is “Stay”, the second to last song on the album that’s a collaboration between Jungkook, Jin, and RM.
“ Stay”正是演出结束时应该播放的那种歌曲 - 高能建造和建造，这是一个可以使每个人都跳来跳去，出汗，双臂伸向空中，灯光爆炸and streaking across the arena and everyone’s screaming and laughing and you can’t help but toss your head back, your arms thrown around the people next to you…
F-CK我想念音乐会。这应该是BTS音乐会果酱。就像音乐会的主食一样，他们的旧歌曲“ Run”的方式使每个人都踩踏。其中只有三个成员的事实意味着它可能并不总是包括在内 - 这真是可耻。我还想在这里提到，“住宿”完全具有加尔文·哈里斯俱乐部（Calvin Harris Club）的氛围，这将使它成为西方广播电台的怪物，如果不是，您知道，它主要是在韩国人和可靠的Xenophopic广播程序员中的事实。
Anyway, if you haven’t already, and if you still haven’t given into my nagging and fallen for BTS yet, maybe because there’s so much content to consume, you’re overwhelmed – ease in with是。您已经知道专辑中的最后一首歌（“炸药”）。
在其他BTS新闻中，他们在新的《时尚》杂志上刊登. The cover piece, written by Dave Holmes, is one of the best (if not the best) western profiles written about the band to date, not only because it’s an accurate and comprehensive explanation of who RM, Jin, Suga, j-hope, Jimin, V, and Jungkook are now but because of what they represent: a new model of masculinity. And when you consider that this is a magazine traditionally by and for men, and in this case specifically American men, spotlighting seven men from South Korea who do not uphold the version of masculinity that is most familiar in America is a CHOICE. Dave Holmes doubles down on that choice in his thesis: that the way BTS performs masculinity is the way masculinity should evolve. This is what Esquire and Dave Holmes are proposing to their readers, American men, in this issue. And what makes this essay that much more special is that Dave, as a vessel for the reader, seems to be experiencing that idea firsthand:
“[BTS’s affection with one another, their vulnerability and emotional openness in their lives and in their lyrics, strikes me as more grown-up and masculine than all the frantic and perpetual box-checking and tone-policing that American boys force themselves and their peers to do. It looks like the future.”
When I posted about BTS’s soft masculinityearlier this year, I wrote about their sensitivity with each other but also in how they engage with people who come into their orbit: a male florist invited on their reality show to teach them how to arrange bouquets, more recently a group of elite gamers who also made an appearance on the show to play silly games with them, and now an American journalist over Zoom; in each interaction the kindness they offer to each other is also shared with strangers. And this kindness is precisely why they’re so desired … by women and by men. Which directly repudiates the archaic notion that sex appeal comes from badness. If there’s any good takeaway from 2020 then, it’s that BTS’s brand of masculinity is going viral too.
他们的男性美丽品牌也流行了。他们是如此美丽。这些图片是如此美丽。所有人……尽管我确实想挑出吉明，因为，请在这张照片中看着他。吉明不经常戴头发是一件好事，因为我不知道自己可以生存。
Just a final note on pictures though and how they project their sensitivity and vulnerability and kindness through their images…
If you’ve been lucky enough to have your picture taken by someone who truly knows you, and loves you for what they know of you, you appreciate the difference it makes in the image. And those looking at it can tell. The affection and the intimacy is unmistakable.
It was Jungkook who directed BTS’s “Life Goes On” videos (there are three version of the video now) and it is so obvious from the visuals how much deeply he adores and respects his bandmates that’s the perfect illustration not only for this song but for the model of masculinity that they demonstrate and uphold.
Click hereto read the BTS cover story at Esquire.
