As BTS‘ leader, RM has a lot of authority in conversations about the direction of the band — and apparently, that includes the members’ solo activities, too. In a new Rolling Stone cover story published Monday (April 13), the performer revealed that he stepped in to persuade the band’s label to allow Jung Kook to sing NSFW lyrics on his chart-topping hit “Seven” featuring Latto, which apparently made some executives wary at first.
While speaking to the publication, RM was candid about his role in helping Jung Kook’s track get off the ground, even when some higher-ups at HYBE supposedly flagged lines such as “And that’s why night after night, I’ll be f–kin’ you right” as cause for concern. “I told the label, ‘Please don’t change!’” the rapper recalled.
“Why not? He’s all grown up,” RM continued. “He can sing an F-word.”
It’s true that the lyrics to “Seven” are much more explicit than BTS’ usual family-friendly refrains, but according to Jung Kook, he had no qualms about singing them on his solo track. Good thing, too, considering the track topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 2023.
“I wasn’t embarrassed,” he told RS. “I just felt, ‘So what?’”
The interview comes a few weeks after the release of ARIRANG, the boy band’s first full-length album since 2020. The LP recently notched its third week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, making all the work the group members did in the studio together in the months immediately after they were all discharged from the South Korean military even more worthwhile.
But in the interview, Jin acknowledged that he’d had some concerns about the musical direction ARIRANG was taking early on in the creative process. Rather than replicating the dance-pop vibes of the band’s past Hot 100 No. 1s “Dynamite” and “Butter,” which he was in favor of, the album is more based in BTS’ hip-hop roots.
“I actually didn’t totally agree with the others on that issue,” Jin told the music. “Because with music, you see certain results, right? So I believed that our most beloved songs are our identity.”
“But not everyone felt that way,” he added. “So after a lot of discussion, I was convinced by the opinion that our identity is in the music we used to make.”
See BTS on the cover of Rolling Stone below.
View this post on Instagram
