BTS appeared to hint at a hiatus during their annual Festa meal, which was streamed live on Tuesday. While the band will take a break, the singers reaffirmed that they do group projects and also solo projects.
At the finale of the dinner, the K-pop singers RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V, and Jungkook were in tears as they discussed their aspirations to focus more on their separate careers.
BTS band’s management organisation, Big Hit Entertainment, has stated that the band is not on sabbatical.
We are not on a hiatus – Clarifies BTS K-pop Singers
A statement from Big Hit released just hours after the dinner said that the BTS members will be focusing more on their solo career, but will still work on projects as a group. The word “hiatus” was used in English subtitles in their dinner video as Suga spoke about their individual careers in Korean.
As per AP, Big Hit later clarified there is no hiatus in a statement that read, “BTS are not taking a hiatus. Members will be focusing more on solo projects at this time.”
It comes as shares of Hybe Corporation (Big Hit) plunged by a record after the band said they will be shifting focus on individual projects. As per a report in Bloomberg, Hybe’s shares sank by 27% on Wednesday, marking its lowest close on record since its trading debut in October 2020.
BTS annually take part in a live-streamed FESTA dinner as a part of their anniversary celebrations. The group sat down for dinner and conversation on Wednesday, a day after marking the ninth anniversary of their debut, and spoke about being ‘exhausted.’ They had recently released a new anthology album, titled Proof, and also live performed it on Tuesday.
RM, leader of the group, said at the dinner, “I’ve always thought that BTS was different from other groups But the problem with K-pop and the whole idol system is that they don’t give you time to mature. You have to keep producing music and keep doing something… I’ve changed as a human over the past 10 years, so I needed to think and have some alone time. Right now when we’re at our best I feel like I should be contributing something to the world, but I don’t know what that is.”