At the 2019 Mnet Asian Music Awards (MAMAs), BTS graced the stage with a three-part performance that highlighted their journey thus far. Similar to their stages at the MelOn Music Awards this past weekend, BTS took fans through their history by performing both old and current songs, as well as looking forward to the future.

The Performance

The performance was titled “Map of the Soul: Journey to Myself,” which really sums up BTS’s entire narrative. Their conceptual timeline has been all about learning, growing, and developing oneself, and they reflected this idea along with the group’s own growth in both their stages and the pre-recorded videos. The first video, titled “Future Meets Past: Calling,” opens with space imagery and a meteor hitting a dome, reminiscent of the space imagery used for “Mikrokosmos” at the MMAs and symbolic of BTS exploding onto the scene.

BTS opened their set with aggressive performances of old songs “N.O” and “We Are Bulletproof Pt. 2.” This stage is perhaps the largest-scale performance we’ve seen of these two tracks, and it was refreshing to see them revisit these concepts on big stages.

The second VCR, titled “Past Meets Present: World,” shows televisions with videos from BTS’s past, looking back on videos from debut, their first music show win, winning awards at large ceremonies, and their rise to global stardom. BTS’s second set consisted of an upbeat performance of “Boy with Luv” followed by “Mikrokosmos,” two songs that signify BTS’s “present.”

“Present Meets Future: Eternal Journey” was the title of the final VCR, and BTS appeared veiled under sheer fabric, as they were seen before performances of “Dionysus” during the Speak Yourself tour. The veils, which are only partially see-through, also bring to mind the idea that BTS’s future is visible on the horizon, but we don’t know exactly what that holds. There’s an animation of a figure running with cuts of the BTS members interspersed throughout, each member holding an item. Jungkook holds up a video camera, Seokjin a pair of vintage-style binoculars, Namjoon a standing mic, Hoseok a photo frame that shows video of BTS, Taehyung a violin, Jimin a polaroid camera, and Yoongi an hourglass. There are also shots of the members framed by circles that resemble the WINGS logo circles.

The video cuts back to the animation of the running figure, which later splits into seven and morphs back into one. Namjoon provides a voiceover in English: “All our time. The past, present, and future, eventually exist in us. The seven years we have been together always exist in the seven members of BTS.” Though brief, this voiceover hints at BTS’s acceptance of their past, present, and future selves and their acknowledgement that those iterations, though from different times, are all part of the selves who live through those moments.

The items the BTS members hold during the VCR are vague enough that they may not mean much. It’s interesting to note that at least three of the members hold items that are related to their hobbies (Taehyung, Jungkook, and Jimin), and some of the other items may be related to BTS’s past work, such as the hourglass (looks similar to the glass case with sand that appears in “Fake Love”) and the standing mic from “Airplane Pt. 2.” The glass case in “Fake Love” isn’t an hourglass, so it’s possible it’s simply a symbol for the passage of time, as the VCR deals with exactly that. The photo frame reminds me of a previous music show performance of “Dionysus” where one was used to frame the shot, and the binoculars conjure up memories of some of the shots from the Love Yourself: Answer album jackets.

When the video cuts back to the stage for “Dionysus,” we see several projections of images made out of stars. Some of the images are linked to constellations, and some are also symbolic of Dionysus himself. For example, there’s a jaguar, a bull, and a goblet, each of which has a known association with this Greek god. There’s also a dolphin, a lion, a ram, and a tiger. Tigers of course are symbolic of Korea, but the decision to include the other images is a bit confusing. A whale would have made sense as a BTS symbol instead of a dolphin, though there is the Delphinus constellation. There’s also a lion constellation (Leo), a ram constellation (Aries), and a tiger constellation (White Tiger). It’s all just conjecture at this point, and it’s possible some of these may make more sense in the future.

A large snake statue appears on the “Dionysus” stage, yet another link to the mythos surrounding Dionysus and his cult. Snakes are also associated with immortality, which can be a link to the title of this part of the stage (“Eternal Journey”). BTS performs the track with high energy, and the cool tones of the stage setup give the performance a much different look than the MMA stage.

There’s a common theory that “Dionysus” may itself be a hint towards the upcoming album, since it’s quite different from the rest of the tracks found on Persona. This stage was labeled as “present meets future,” so this could potentially be a clue that something from BTS’s present (“Dionysus”) is indicative of what’s coming in the future—maybe “Dionysus” will turn out to be an indicator of the sound style of the next album in the series.

A Second Daesang Sweep

BTS won the awards for Best Male Group, Favorite Male Artist, Best Dance Performance for Male Group, Best Music Video, and Worldwide Fans’ Choice. By the end of the night, they also took home all four daesangs (grand prizes) in the categories of Song of the Year, Album of the Year, Worldwide Icon of the Year, and Artist of the Year. Several BigHit team members also won, including Bang Shihyuk for Best Executive Producer of the Year, PDOGG for Best Composer of the Year, and Lumpens for Best Video Director of the Year. Additionally, Lee Sora’s “Song Request” featuring Yoongi won the Best Collaboration award.

With their wins at the MAMAs, BTS has become the first group to win all daesangs at both the MMAs and the MAMAs, making for a truly historic night. At the moment, BTS’s award season trophy total is a whopping seventeen.

For their many awards speeches, BTS was sure to emphasize their gratitude towards fans for supporting them so much. Namjoon thanked international fans during his speech for the Worldwide Icon daesang, noting that ARMYs made BTS’s persona. Of important note, Seokjin made a light mention of some recent issues during his speech for Song of the Year. Sajaegi is a form of chart manipulation where companies or artists buy copies of an album in order to boost the chart ranking—it’s actually something BTS and BigHit were accused of years ago, before the company even had the means to do something of that nature. Though BTS’s own accusations were false, chart manipulation does happen. In the nicest way possible (and honestly, nicer than the issue deserves), Seokjin commented that it’d be great if good music could be heard and appreciated through honest means.

During the Artist of the Year speech, Yoongi recalled how the members had cried at last year’s MAMAs, and how they’ve grown and become stronger, able to look back on that time and smile even though it was tough. In the same speech, Namjoon thanked all of the staff and other artists, telling them they’ve worked hard too. Their speeches are best viewed in full, so definitely keep an eye on bangtansubs.com for full uploads of these moving speeches.   

Both the MMA and MAMA wins are a satisfying way to close out the year, for both BTS and ARMY. BTS’s year isn’t over yet, but we all have a lot to look back on and reflect upon as we move into the new year and the upcoming album.