It was the year 2015 when One Direction announced their break-up, and fans still live in the hope that they will reunite someday. Now the music world sees another bomb drop on it with another favourite band hitting pause. The popular South Korean band, BTS has decided to part ways with members to focus on solo projects. 

The band officially announced the hiatus during their FESTA dinner that premiered on YouTube. RM, Jin, SUGA, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jungkook talked about beginning the second chapter of their journey. They talked about focusing more on solo projects and discovering themselves as artists. Bangtan assured fans that the band is taking a break only to come back stronger, and to everyone’s relief, Suga explained, “BTS is not disbanding.”

Suga added, “We’re going on a hiatus now. Should we talk about why we’re not doing the FESTA or making content?” RM followed by talking about how as a group the band feel lost. He commented, “I started music and became BTS because I had a message for the world.” He added that the group has changed with all the things that the pandemic brought in. 

“We have to accept that we’ve changed. For me, it was like the group BTS was within my grasp until ‘On’ and ‘Dynamite,’ but after ‘Butter’ and ‘Permission to Dance,’ I didn’t know what kind of group we were anymore,” RM said adding that they don’t want to give in to the K-Pop culture that doesn’t allow an artist to mature. 

The news crushed the ARMY. Twitter was flooded with sad posts about the band making this call. Many fans expressed their hope to see them back together soon and stated that they will wait for the reunion, no matter how long it takes. 

Here’s What Fans Have To Say:

BTS members did promise a return soon. “When the time is right we want to come back and keep doing what we love,” they ensured. A spokesperson for the group informed Billboard that even though the band will not be performing together, “BTS will continue to be active in different formats, including working on solo projects.”

This will be BTS‘ third hiatus since the band’s debut in 2013. In 2019, they took a month-long break, and then an “extended period of rest” in late 2021. 

(Featured Image Credits: Instagram @btsofficial)