Sophia Michaels
Fans of K-pop have been enamored with BTS since they first showed up on the scene in 2013. Originating in Seoul, South Korea, BTS is one of today’s most popular music groups in the world, and their record sales certainly speak for themselves.
Recently reaching a huge milestone in their home country, BTS is again making headlines by announcing their fourth Korean-language album, Map of the Soul: 7, a comeback to their hugely successful EP Map of the Soul: Persona. Haven’t heard about Map of the Soul: Persona? Well, you are definitely missing out!
2019 was a huge year for BTS
If you haven’t heard of BTS, where have you been for the past year? 2019 was filled with huge achievements for the K-pop sensation. In June, the group sold-out Wembley Stadium in London for a two-day show — a venue that can hold 90,000 people — in just 90 minutes after ticket sales opened.
Another similarly huge milestone, though on a much more intimate stage, BTS headlined NBC’s Saturday Night Live, reaching millions of viewers and becoming the first K-pop group to star as the show’s musical guest.
For the third year in a row, BTS won the Billboard Music Awards’ Top Social Artist prize, which Justin Bieber had won for the previous six years in a row. They’ve collaborated with huge artists such as Halsey, Ed Sheeran, and Steve Aoki.
They also presented their first Grammy award, again being the first K-pop group to do so. With how huge 2019 was for BTS, we can’t wait to see what they do in 2020.
BTS’s record sales speak for themselves
Map of the Soul: Persona was understandably predicted to be one of the biggest projects of the year. BTS is always giving fans more, putting out new music faster than many others in their genre, and 2019 was a huge year for the septet.
This EP dropped in April and, within a month, it had already broken the record for most copies sold in the country in all of South Korea’s history. The music industry has never seen the likes of BTS’s record sales.
Not only is that a huge achievement on its own, but BTS also had to go the extra mile. By the end of the year, Map of the Soul: Persona wasn’t just the top-selling album for the year, but it actually sold more copies than all of the rest of the top five best-selling albums combined.
Their hit EP sold 3.69 million copies over the year. Combined, the four best-selling albums below them sold 2.71 million copies. The number two slot was taken by Seventeen with their album An Ode, which sold a total of 849,282 copies in 2019. Certainly impressive, but not even close to the huge number that BTS sold.
What’s next for BTS?
BTS recently announced their comeback album Map of the Soul: 7, to be released on February 21st. Time will tell if this album will be able to match Map of the Soul: Persona, but it’s safe to say that whether it outsells it or not, it will definitely be in the top five best-selling albums of 2020 in their home country.
Along with this announcement of a new album has come speculation that there might be another tour on the way for BTS. Their last U.S. tour happened in 2019, with their Love Yourself, Speak Yourself tour, but fans are clearly already wanting more.
Many groups plan tours after releasing a new album, but BTS will likely schedule an Asian/Europe tour before coming as far as the U.S. Whatever their plan is, it’s safe to say that they’ll still easily sell out whatever venues they want!
Written by: CheatSheet
