BTS aren’t interested in rounding off their grand comeback album, ARIRANG, with the chance to take home a few golden gramophones. The supergroup will not submit the album for consideration for the 2027 Grammy Awards, each member revealed through individual Instagram Story posts on July 29.
“We decided not to participate in the Grammys this year,” BTS shared in a statement translated from Korean. The seven-piece shared their “hope that music can be heard and loved by itself rather than being divided by region or language.”
BTS has been nominated for five Grammy Awards over the past five years. Their breakthrough crossover single “Dynamite” earned them their first nomination for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance in 2020. They were nominated again in the same category for “Butter” the following year. In November 2022, just over a month after BTS announced plans for an extended hiatus while each member completed their mandatory military service, they received three nominations for the 2023 Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year as featured guests on Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres.
Three of BTS’ five nominations have been in the Best Pop Duo/Group Performance category. Fans have speculated that their withdrawal from consideration for the 2027 awards ceremony could be connected to recent category changes at the Recording Academy. In June, five new categories were announced including Best Asian Pop Music Performance.
“This Category recognizes artistic excellence in Asian pop music performances originating from or widely recognized within Asian markets, including but not limited to K-pop, J-pop and C-pop, with meaningful use of one or more Asian languages,” the description for the new addition reads.
In an interview with Grammy.com, Grammys CEO Harvey Mason Jr. described Asian pop music as “one of the most significant and sustained forces in the global music industry,” adding, “With an integrated approach to music, performance and presentation, Asian pop is distinct in its musical identity. As we move forward, we can continue to explore additional ways of recognizing even more creators within the broader Asian music community.”
The songs that earned BTS Grammys recognition in the past were smooth disco-pop tracks with filler lyrics and far less creative involvement from each member than their earlier releases. With ARIRANG, they came back around to a sound that felt more connected to their roots and familiar to early listeners. “Because with music, you see certain results, right? So I believed that our most beloved songs are our identity,” Jin told Rolling Stone in BTS’ cover story earlier this year. “But not everyone felt that way, so after a lot of discussion, I was convinced by the opinion that our identity is in the music we used to make.”
Does that automatically assign them to this new “Asian Pop Music” category, rather than the more general pop categories? We won’t have a chance to find out unless they have a change of heart in the future.
Online entry for the 2027 Grammy Awards opened on July 7 and closes on Aug. 21. First round voting will begin on Oct. 12 with the official announcement of nominees on Nov. 16. The 2027 Grammy Awards will be hosted on Feb. 7.
BTS have also been thinking about another major music moment scheduled around the same time as music’s biggest night: the Super Bowl halftime show. After watching Bad Bunny make history as the first Super Bowl headliner to perform a set in Spanish — just after his album Debi Tirar Mas Fotos became the first all-Spanish-language album to win Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards — BTS began considering what roads might be open for them beyond the existing parameters of traditional popular music spaces.
“Maybe if time goes by, and the thoughts in the people change,” RM told Rolling Stone. “All of the people in the world are watching Parasite,” he added, referencing Bong Joon Ho’s 2019 film, which became the first non-English language film to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. “All these great things in Korean culture, so if there’s a chance, we definitely want to, some day.”