Interlude Shadow and Beyond
In this article, Byeol Korea will discuss BTS’s Suga’s past stories and how they relate to the BTS comeback song, “Interlude: Shadow.” Beyond becoming a global superstar, there laid his past, which inspired him in creating his masterpieces and to be the person he is now. Want to learn more about his story? Keep reading!
BTS Suga and His Anxiety Story
Suga, one of the idol rappers from the worldwide-recognized K-pop boy group, BTS, with the real name Min Yoongi, is known for his quiet personality. The fans have recognized him as the type of person who doesn’t allow himself to talk uselessly, but only when it comes to anything that has meaning to him. When he does talk, he is more likely to be a to-the-point kind of guy. But deep down, he has this kind of charming personality, and he sometimes shows how caring he is to the members.
Behind his interesting personality, Suga has an anxiety disorder based on fear. The doubts inside his head were building and spreading in his mind like cancer. During a radio interview in 2014, he openly spoke up about his depression. At first, the discussion was about his ongoing body-image issues, then he continued to share his past story, that he used to have quite a large body size but he worked hard to lose weight.
Back then, he had battled depression since his pre-debut days. He stated that he tried to work really hard, and managed to fit the image of the K-pop industry’s ideal criteria. Before starting to jump in the music industry, he used to work as a deliveryman and got into an accident that caused an injury to his shoulder. The doctor said to stop exercising, but in order to maintain the ideal body shape, Suga didn’t give up and went through the struggles. It was also said that he didn’t get support from his parents in pursuing his dreams of becoming a musician. But he overcame the hardships, and came out as a global rap star. Through his vlog on March 21, 2013, we could see him looking melancholic while saying, “I’m starting to have a bunch of weird, random thoughts, so I guess I could say that I’m struggling a bit.”
In 2016, he was back to discussing deeper mental health issues with Grazie magazine. After he released Agust D’s mixtape, most of the songs’ lyrics were about dealing with depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and social anxiety. On the track “The Last”, he shares his experiences when he sought for professional help and how he’s been feeling while working to be a K-Pop idol.
Suga Rap During the Song No More Dream
BTS’ debut started with bringing up simple, yet actually very important issues, “dreams”. At the beginning of the song, Suga’s part started to strike our ears with his pretty sarcastic lyrics:
“I want a big house, big cars, and big rings, actually I don’t have any big dreams.
Haha, I live quite comfortably, even if I don’t dream, no one says anything”
The group’s very first single “No More Dream” follows a generally motivational theme, telling the fans to follow their own dreams rather than fall prey to society’s expectations. In an interview, Suga said that there were many of his friends at school who seemed confused about their dreams. That’s why he decided to choose the topic ‘dreams’ as a debut song. “I want them to start looking for what they want to do in the future, what is their dreams,” he said.
Another part of Suga’s lyrics:
“Ok, sick of the same day, the repeating days.
Grown-ups and my parents keep instilling confined dreams to me.
Number one future career is a government worker? It’s not a forced dream”
Through the lyrics, he expressed how he was not getting support from his parents while pursuing his dream to be a musician. By not giving up, going through the ups and downs, he managed to be one of the worldwide idols, and became an inspiration for most fans.
But, boy, the iconic “I want a big house, big cars, and big rings” was not just a dream!
Hidden Message on Shadow
“Interlude: Shadow” is BTS’s comeback song which got more than 9 million views for the official trailer music video. The music video is, indeed, rich in imagery. In the music video, he stands in a red-streaked hotel lobby surrounded by hooded figures representing his multiple egos and desires to suddenly standing at the top of the world. He’s wearing a Dior vest, holding his mic, and still surrounded by shadows. The visuals send a lot of clues and hints to the story, and leave the fans creating theories and speculating about conspiracies. Let’s check out the MV!
Despite the visuals of the video, let’s talk about the meaning behind the lyrics. The meaning behind “Shadow” itself refers to one of the personalities (persona, shadow, ego, and self) of a human being. The concept is inspired by Swiss psychologist Carl Jung’s major archetypes of the human mind. The boys are trying to say that they have explored their personas as they cultivated themselves as global superstars. In this song, “Shadow“, Suga addresses the shadows and darkness around himself that he developed as he pursued a career in the music industry.
We can see that he is saying how he wants to get to the top, but as he does, he shines more and his shadow grows bigger, turning into a monster that devours him. The difficulty he has in recognizing himself as Suga and Min Yoongi is also sent. In other words, he is slowly losing himself with everything he goes through. It is also spotted at the end of the music video, when he is walking through the crowd that doesn’t recognize him because they focus on Suga, not Min Yoongi.
He really expresses his inner conflict so well through the MV.
Behind The Scenes
Not long after the video was released, Suga unveiled it by showing the shooting footage from behind the scenes. In the video, he shares about his thoughts and explained the process of the shooting. Let’s watch how the camera captures Suga’s amazing shots!
Latest News
This year would become another hit of BTS’s comeback, but apparently, Big Hit informed the public that the music show attendance during the BTS’ Map Of The Soul: 7 promotion would ban audiences due to the coronavirus issues. This decision led the boys to perform live without ARMYs. Here is the live performance of “ON” on M Countdown!
Even though ARMYs were not there, the boys still gave it all for the live performance. Suga expressed how he felt about the live performance, saying “it’s not fun without ARMY.”
on 활동 잘 마무리 하였습니다! 짝짝짝 아미 여러분이 없어 허전한 활동이였지만 즐거웠습니다 사랑해요 아미! pic.twitter.com/WmhClFiB6p
— 방탄소년단 (@BTS_twt) March 8, 2020
Well, that’s all for Suga’s past story and its correlation to “Interlude: Shadow“. Glad to know that he is doing well now! His story brings important messages to society’s issues about mental health. Anyone who is struggling with mental health issues, you need to know that you are not alone, and this shall pass. We know that Suga doesn’t want you to give up. Hwaiting!
Don’t forget to drop your thoughts in the comment section!
