As BTS’s debut began shaping up, the trainees at Big Hit Entertainment were divided into two groups. One was the high-potential group of trainees who seemed ready for their debut, and the other group was made up of trainees whose debut wasn’t yet confirmed. RM, SUGA, and j-hope were in the first group.
______I thought, ‘Wow, I want to be there, too.’ Because I’d come here
because of Rap Monster. Jung Kook was famously brought on by Big Hit Entertainment in 2011 at one of the auditions for Superstar K3, a TV audition program on Mnet. But the story of how a Busan middle schooler named Jeon Jungkook decided to come to Cheonggu Building in Seoul is a bit more complicated than that. Jung Kook had already received business cards from seven different entertainment companies during the Superstar K3 auditions.
______None of them really told me why they wanted to sign me. I
remember one of the companies wanted me to come to a hotel room near the Superstar K3 audition site for an audition. They wanted to
get a video of me singing.
The first reason Big Hit managed to beat the odds and secure Jung Kook was, oddly enough, MBC’s Star Audition: The Great Birth, a direct
competitor to Superstar K. On that show, Bang Si-Hyuk was featured as a mentor for the auditioning hopefuls. Jung Kook says:
______Bang Si-Hyuk was famous, according to my dad, and he suggested I try going into his company.
Just as RM used the Internet to learn about rap artists, Jung Kook
searched the Internet for more information on Big Hit Entertainment and learned of the rapper trainees there who were preparing for their debut, including RM, whose rap videos were available on YouTube. Jung Kook says:
______Hyung’s rap was great and his English was so impressive, I said, “This is where I’ll go!” But when he auditioned for Superstar K3, Jung Kook wasn’t sure he
wanted to be a singer necessarily.
______Sports, art, music … I was pretty good at arts and sports, which made me think, ‘Maybe this is where my aptitude is.’ So as I was wondering whether to do sports or art, I thought why not try becoming a singer.
That was a job a lot of people would appreciate, so I auditioned. It wasn’t exactly a joke, but I wasn’t worrying
myself going, ‘What if I fail?’ either.
Meeting Rap Monster, whom Jung Kook had gotten to know through an Internet search, as well as a host of other rappers at the dorm he eventually entered, was like seeing a new world open before him. From his first day there in June 2011, it was like getting several older brothers all at once.
Jung Kook remembers:
______j-hope would come back to the dorm really late and take out a meal from the fridge and eat it, while going, “Do you want some?” to me. And the “hyungs” would take their new little brother everywhere. Jung Kook laughs as he remembers:
______Not long after I entered the dorm, one of the hyungs played a prank on me. He claimed anyone who just moved in had to buy everyone bingsu. So I did, and we all ate it together.
The three hyungs who had gone to auditions to achieve their dreams.
The little brother who went to an audition program and became a trainee after being inspired by such hyungs. This slight generational difference foreshadowed that the world was about to change not only for Jung Kook but for the rapper trainees as well.
This “Season 2,” as referred to by j-hope, was a prelude to “Idol
Season.” To the future members of BTS, idols—along with hip-hop and their bond with each other—became another cornerstone of their identity.
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Behind the story
Nouvelles10-year record of BTS It's real story of BTS It was about the phenomenal journey of the world's biggest boy band called BTS It was written by the group themselves and journalist Kang Myeong-Seok, who interviewed them extensively for this project.
