by They once again wrote a new history of Korean popular music. Jimin of the group BTS rose to No. 1 on the US Billboard’s main singles chart, ‘Hot 100’, with the song ‘Like Crazy’ on his solo album. This is the first time for a Korean solo singer.
Looking at the top 10 songs of this week’s ‘Hot 100’ released by Billboard on Twitter on the 4th, Jimin’s ‘Like Crazy,’ pop star Miley Cyrus’s ‘Flowers,’ and country rising star Morgan Wallen’s ‘Last Night.’, and R&B singer-songwriter Caesar’s ‘Kill Bill.’
Until now, BTS was the only Korean singer to top the ‘Hot 100’. Starting with ‘Dynamite’ in 2020 and ‘My Universe,’ a collaborative song with the band Coldplay in 2021, BTS reached the top of the ‘Hot 100’ with six songs.
For a solo singer, Psy’s ‘Gangnam Style’ in 2012 stayed at number 2 for seven consecutive weeks, the highest record. As Jimin took first place with a solo song this time, he set a new record for the group, and the solo music reached the top.
Billboard’s ‘Hot 100’ ranks digital music streaming and downloads, physical album sales, and radio broadcast times. ‘Like Crazy’ recorded sales of 254,000 by adding music downloads and CD singles from the 24th to the 30th of last month, the ranking aggregation period. There were 10 million music streaming and 64,000 radio listeners.
The title song ‘Like Crazy’ of Jimin’s first official solo album, ‘Face,’ released on the 24th of last month, is a synth-pop genre song featuring a synthesizer. Famous singers such as The Weeknd and Harry Styles have recently gained tremendous popularity with retro synth-pop. In this trend, there is an analysis that Jimin’s songs are familiar to American music fans.
Inspired by his favorite romance movie (2018), Jimin directly participated in writing and composing the lyrics. The lyrics contain the content of wanting to stay in the dream forever even though she suffers while searching for the person she loved in her dreams and loses herself trapped in the colorful lights. Jimin introduced, “It’s a song that expresses the emotions of the moment when you turn away from reality to forget your scars.”
Apart from the original song, Jimin also released an English version of ‘Like Crazy,’ a deep house remix version, and a UK garage remix version. The strategy of increasing music sales while giving fans various options positively affected the charts. Billboard ranks songs by adding the sales of the original song and the remix version.
