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4.47 AVERAGE
4.47 AVERAGE
I really enjoyed reading this book. Only being an ARMY for a little over a year now, there was information that I didn't know. They faced many challenges and hardships through their years. It's been interesting reading about their journey to where they are now. They are such incredible artists and so hard-working and dedicated to their music. I appreciated the QR codes to watch older videos and performances. I wanted to take my time reading this and was listening to their music as I went along. I loved this book so much.
I can’t figure out what audience this book was written for. For fans, there wasn’t much new information, though the access to the boys for direct quotes was nice. For those casually curious, I don’t know that they’d enjoy a 400 page chronology that describes lyrics, music videos, and performances with great detail. It did make me appreciate their origins and the early days of BTS though.
One of my personal rules as a reviewer is that I don’t rate memoirs or biographies with stars, it doesn't just seem right. So no star ratings for this one. But I will be sharing my thoughts
I've been a fan for over five years now and this might be my bias speaking but I think this was a really good book.
Now some people might complain and say the information here can simply be searched online and this there's no need for a book. But I think with the way things are going digitally, it is very important to get such information stored physically.
More than just facts or timelines, what made this book meaningful was hearing their own thoughts, their fears, dreams and doubts.
I've been a fan for over five years now and this might be my bias speaking but I think this was a really good book.
Now some people might complain and say the information here can simply be searched online and this there's no need for a book. But I think with the way things are going digitally, it is very important to get such information stored physically.
More than just facts or timelines, what made this book meaningful was hearing their own thoughts, their fears, dreams and doubts.
I already knew most of the things in this record. I have been a fan since their debut. The choppy writing which may be a result of the translation issue more than anything was hard to bare for the 188 pages that I read. It will make a great part of my BTS collection, but I won't finish reading it..
medium-paced
I don't know that I consider myself ARMY anymore, for a plethora of reasons. For a good number of years, kpop was my only reason for living, and it's very interesting to be in a more balanced position in my life and reading this book, which I know past me would have been feral for. It was certainly obvious to me that this book was written for one consumer which is ARMY. You'd be hardpressed to find an individual who would read this and finish it when this does nothing more than read like an elongated, heavily quoted Wikipedia article. In fact, I'm not really sure what the point of this book really was. It certainly wasn't meant to draw in new listeners because at no point did this introduce BTS to you or explain anything about Korean music culture and it also felt far too sterile to be something that current ARMY fans would find new or revolutionary. If you know how BTS came to be, and you know the stories behind their albums, than you have literally no need to read this book. The fact that HYBE already oversells BTS just made me shake my head a bit at how easy it is to get a load of cash from fans. Myself having been one of them. But I've had this book on my shelf for two years now and I'm tired of having books on my shelf that I don't read, so it was finally time to take a walk down memory lane I suppose.
The quotes from the members were by far my favorite part, and I really loved seeing that their personal experiences were the impetus of their most profound and impactful music. Their ability to introspect and ponder their place in this world and the source of their unhappiness really lended a space for anyone to introspect and wonder their own positions in the world and it truly did breed a community that was founded on authenticity, loving one's self and chasing after your dreams. It's not a wonder to me how messages like that, told from a very sincere and heartfelt place, would resonate to a global audience. It's a message that is timeless and universally felt.
I really would have appreciated a more scrutable examination of the kpop industry as a whole. It made me very sad to read how much BTS suffered at the cost of what was expected of them. It's the main reason why kpop is not such a high priority in my life anymore. Reading about each of these members slowly losing touch of who they were, losing interest in life itself and how they express this confusion of why they seemed so depressed and disconnected and I just wanted to scream, "You're depressed because you were literally children who weren't allowed to have normalcy the moment you became a trainee and your life lost any sense of privacy or autonomy and you lost all of your previous friends and your home and the support system you had and you didn't even have a therapist to help you through this because S. Korea is still figuring that bit out and instead you were expected to dance for 12 hours and believe that the love of your fans and the music would make up for anything else." Truly, I'm apalled that more people didn't read this and realize how much of a commodity artists are to these companies - in both Western and Eastern media - and how little dignity they are given once their lives are made public. It really didn't sit right with me and how we seem to easily dismiss it.
"Fantasy is an important compononent of K-pop. 2019 was an endless repitition of thinking about this aspect, of me trying to close the distance. Between my persona as a member of BTS and the actual person that I was or wanted to be. To be honest, it's fine if I were perceived as just another member of BTS. Pretending I'm something else would require more of an effort, anyway. And whenever I meet my fans, I'm so grateful to them that I want to hug them all. Telling them, 'Thanks to you, I'm alive and breathing and making music.' But what I'm wondering is 'Can I do that and at the same time keep selling the fantasy?' I know there are people who think, 'You're not real people, stop pretending like you are,' 'But you guys make lots of money,' and all that. This makes me think we're on a bridge made of glass that lies across such boundaries. And we can see how far it falls below...So it's also scary. Because just one crack means we're going to fall."
For me, this book was both a sentimental walk down memory lane of some of my happiest and hardest memories as well as a expose on celebrity culture and the affect that it has on human individuals.
It also just reminded me how much we don't deserve RM. Someone give him a long nap, please.
The quotes from the members were by far my favorite part, and I really loved seeing that their personal experiences were the impetus of their most profound and impactful music. Their ability to introspect and ponder their place in this world and the source of their unhappiness really lended a space for anyone to introspect and wonder their own positions in the world and it truly did breed a community that was founded on authenticity, loving one's self and chasing after your dreams. It's not a wonder to me how messages like that, told from a very sincere and heartfelt place, would resonate to a global audience. It's a message that is timeless and universally felt.
I really would have appreciated a more scrutable examination of the kpop industry as a whole. It made me very sad to read how much BTS suffered at the cost of what was expected of them. It's the main reason why kpop is not such a high priority in my life anymore. Reading about each of these members slowly losing touch of who they were, losing interest in life itself and how they express this confusion of why they seemed so depressed and disconnected and I just wanted to scream, "You're depressed because you were literally children who weren't allowed to have normalcy the moment you became a trainee and your life lost any sense of privacy or autonomy and you lost all of your previous friends and your home and the support system you had and you didn't even have a therapist to help you through this because S. Korea is still figuring that bit out and instead you were expected to dance for 12 hours and believe that the love of your fans and the music would make up for anything else." Truly, I'm apalled that more people didn't read this and realize how much of a commodity artists are to these companies - in both Western and Eastern media - and how little dignity they are given once their lives are made public. It really didn't sit right with me and how we seem to easily dismiss it.
"Fantasy is an important compononent of K-pop. 2019 was an endless repitition of thinking about this aspect, of me trying to close the distance. Between my persona as a member of BTS and the actual person that I was or wanted to be. To be honest, it's fine if I were perceived as just another member of BTS. Pretending I'm something else would require more of an effort, anyway. And whenever I meet my fans, I'm so grateful to them that I want to hug them all. Telling them, 'Thanks to you, I'm alive and breathing and making music.' But what I'm wondering is 'Can I do that and at the same time keep selling the fantasy?' I know there are people who think, 'You're not real people, stop pretending like you are,' 'But you guys make lots of money,' and all that. This makes me think we're on a bridge made of glass that lies across such boundaries. And we can see how far it falls below...So it's also scary. Because just one crack means we're going to fall."
For me, this book was both a sentimental walk down memory lane of some of my happiest and hardest memories as well as a expose on celebrity culture and the affect that it has on human individuals.
It also just reminded me how much we don't deserve RM. Someone give him a long nap, please.
3.5/5 I don’t think this was a bad book by any means, but it was a lot of info that you would know by a simple google search. It was a lot of repetitiveness and felt a bit convoluted, maybe from the company. I absolutely loved the direct quotes from the members that felt so genuine and honest, and honestly, that’s the only thing that kept me reading. I’m a fairly new fan, and there was a lot of info I knew, so I’m not sure who the target audience was, because if you’ve been a fan for awhile, this would have been even more repetitive for you. All in all, it was horrible. I appreciate the honesty the members were willing to share and some more insight on events and their thoughts.
I don't think it's fair to rate memoirs or biographies because it's like judging their life decisions and what they've been through. But I really enjoyed reading it and walking through their life while doing so.
informative
medium-paced