The Beautiful Tragedy of Interlude : Shadow
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- Опубліковано 9 лют 2025
- I do not own any mv or standalone footage shown in this video, please support the official release!
Note: This is a video essay based on my own observations and opinions formed because of this music, please form your own and feel free to share your opinions down below!
WARNING: THIS VIDEO BRIEFLY TACKLES HEAVIER SUBJECTS LIKE DEPRESSION, PLEASE CLICK AWAY IF YOU MAY BE UNFORMORTABLE.
Interlude : Shadow MV: • BTS (방탄소년단) MAP OF THE...
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#kpop #bts #agustd
I am glad you talked about this topic because on the daily I feel like we have to deal with K-pop Stan’s always calling BTS “mediocre and basic” artists in music but when you sit down and really listen and even read the lyrics to a lot of their discography the music, talent and skill can not be matched by a lot. BTS get really disrespected but are some who put so much effort in their music and that’s something I feel proud of them for.
So true
Suga's rawness is what made him my ult bias. This song is about him talking with his shadows in the context of the theories of Carl Jung. The shadow is that part of yourself that is difficult to accept cause it's not pretty, but it's still part of who you are and you need to accept it to truly discover yourself.
Looks like Suga's shadow is what you said in the video: he always had ambition to get to the top, but when he got there he got scared of falling, cause the higher you get, the worse the fall is.
Interlude: Shadow is one of my all- time favorites. It's such a great accompaniment to Black Swan
I really do agree with this.
BTS music should be taken seriously, they tackle serious topics and produce amazing music and short films- that all relate to their storyline .
Of course that’s all subjective but still, this song is absolutely phenomenal and should get more recognition. Thank you for this amazing video essay. Keep up the great work you have earned a subscriber.
one of my favorite things about bts, namjoon and yoongi specifically is that they always talk about important issues that are overlooked. like everybody wants to be an idol until they become an idol.
saiki k pfp and a bts fan, now that's a huge w
Sometime I’ve noticed in Suga’s music videos from Agust D, this one, or parts of him back in the HYYH series, there’s almost always another version of himself. He always kills himself in the end or can’t save himself.
Shadow's MV really emphasized the kind of struggles bts face as being very popular but I think you were able to say more of its message here. Being at the top is cool but it definitely has its downsides and I'm glad the boys were able to share that openly with us.
Interlude : Shadow is my fave song on the MotS : 7 album. I had it on repeat for MONTHS. And I still listen to it quite often. It's a phenomenal song in every way. I noticed SUGA's songs have always personally been my faves. I mean, my ultimate fave BTS song to date is Tomorrow, and SUGA made that one as well. He truly creates masterpieces.
And he made it while he was still in high school which is just crazy
I realized the duality on my first or second listen when the MV first came out, but the comments and fans still today were just “aww he says I wanna be a star but he already is 🥺” and completely missed the message that it’s a constant battle between pride and humility.
Glad you’re covering this song, this is my favourite rap song from BTS and I’m happy to find like-minded people here as well. There’s so much meaning put into MOTS:7 that I hope gets analysed more in the future.
Can you also please analyse 'BE'? It's completely overlooked, but the tracks are extremely well articulated especially considering they just wrote down their internal feelings. Blue and Grey is the most poetic song that describes depression at its best (coming from someone clinically depressed), and disease describes the monotony during pandemic, the inability to not feel guilty by taking a rest (especially as artists), how mental health is not treated as a disease and how we compare life struggles of the world to disregard our own state. Especially since people talk as if they didn't release music during the pandemic except the English singles. And their 3 Japanese singles are also well written.
BLUE AND GREY just puts it all into words
There is a video by the channel Wandering thoughts where she covers the BE album as a hole in an essay style video. You should check it out if you want a deep dive into the album
I have watched this video so many tims and every time i watch it I'm more blown by the song and the explanation. I love lt , thanks for the great video and can't wait for the Agust D video.❤
This was the first kpop song I’ve ever really encountered, still holds a special place in my heart. 🖤
I feel like some new kpop fans (especially during and post pandemic) underestimated BTS music just because of their recent english songs. Yes Dynamite, Butter are some very catchy popular songs but BTS true essence is in those album series that tells stories (HYYH, Wings, Love Yourself, Map of the Souls, etc). They have been doing it since debut. I feel like Map of the Soul: 7 and the ON era got overshadowed by the unexpected success of Dynamite in 2020. Dynamite is a bright, fun catchy song that was easy to enjoy and with the context of 2020, its success hit was understandable. But Dynamite was a simple song that cannot be compared artisically with Map of the Soul: 7. ON is the perfect title track that showcases BTS strength in every aspect, Black Swan is a master piece and the members solo tracks convey the members identities well. Interlude: Shadow is probably one of the darkest and intense tracks of MOTS: 7 and BTS discrography as a whole, and Suga perfectly delivered it. Out of the 3 rapline members, Suga is the most intense. He has this rawness and intensity that makes his rap part and the song much more powerful. BTS music has always been meaningful with layers of meanings. I know their recent English songs has not been the best and most 'BTS' songs, but we can see they are back with their beautiful lyrics and meanings with their solo albums now.
quite frankly on the surface this just seems like an ordinary song but the moment I saw snippets of the mv I knew it's much deeper than that. I wish ppl paid more attention to songs like this because sometimes idol do express themselves but ppl just choose to ignore them
MOTS: 7 is always going to have a special place in my heart.
I feel that there are some underrated songs in there because of the pandemic. A lot of time people is going to remember more songs that were performed multiple times.
Shadow is one of my favs.
^^^ I completely agree that mots 7 is overshadowed
@@vjouska yes. That is a better word than underrated. Thank you
I think we shouldn't review Shadow without Persona and Ego.
There is a particular structure in MOTS: 7.
In Persona Namjoon is asking questions like 'who am i', 'why am i doing what i'm doing' and talking about his persona, his image in public
And there's Shadow, which is continuing the theme that appears in Persona.
In conclusion, there's Ego, where jhope reflects on his path and kinda finds the answer to questions that were asked by Persona and Shadow.
Edit: just grammar, my english sucks
This album and particular this track defined my completely turn in my life from understanding my own mental state, being able to articulate years of complex thoughts via the whole carl jung based music, diving deeper I studied it with so much interest because it saved my life and helped me get help, that I eventually used this knowledge in an interview which went successfully. They literally turned over my future!
Thank you for reminding me that Louder than Bombs exists! I've been busy with life and have fallen out of bts for a while (but I'm still following their music releases) and I haven't been listening to bts's songs for a few months now. Now that my exams are almost over, I can listen to their discography from the beginning again! 😊
Edit: this video is about Shadow but I'm talking about LTB 😂
Another reason to love your content for me: taking the time to make an Interlude:Shadow video :’-) it’s one of my top songs ever
When I first heard Shadow and read the lyrics, I knew I would never forget it. It's such a special song.
Thank you for this video. If I didn’t love the song so much, I’d be able to say more about it, but as it is, well done. It was one of the songs I listened to when I was first discovering BTS, recommended by a friend, and it blew me away at least three separate times in just my first listen (and that was before I knew there was a video, too)
I would never, ever, ever want to be famous, even a little bit famous. My mental health has never been the greatest, and I think I might actually lose my mind entirely if I were subjected to even a fraction of that pressure and scrutiny and uncertainty
I love Shadow in a heart-breaking way.
I found it really interesting how he compared the lights (of cameras) to his fame and how the bigger the light (fame) is, the greater will be the shadow.
I hadn't actually thought of the Yoongi in the crowd as a younger Yoongi - I thought that he represented the 'shadow' lurking in between the lights. But a younger Suga makes sense too, because like you said, young-Yoongi was a 'normal' (not very famous) person. I like that perspective.
I hope more people listen to Shadow and read the lyrics. It's one of my favourite songs to think about. Loved your video!
Another great video!
Yoongi is my bias in bts so I really appreciated this one.
The irony was not lost on me that right after MOTS was released BTS became even more famous.
The rapline have touched on this topic before, RM’s song wildflower is a good recent example. It’s quite interesting because usually you just get bragging when people end up at the top.
man i love this music video, so many meanings to unpack. my interpretation of when he’s the crowd is that he’s levelling himself with the rest of society. the cameras are still on him but it’s like he’s showing he’s human, someone who does wrong and struggles like the rest of us, yet everything he does publicly is under scrutiny
I listened to shadow religiously for a long time and weren't back to watching the mv several times. It made me question if I ever want to be at the very top, as I have gone through minor versions of been known and I think it inherently made me take a step a back.
This album itself is one of the most beautiful and tragic written album in my opinion, but I feel like some of the songs are not talked about enough or appreciated enough.
I'm glad you talked about it, it's probably one of my favorite songs ever!! I'm literally so passionate about it 🫠
To me, interlude shadow is the apogee of yoongi's reflections dealing with his complicated and contradictory feelings, and it's a perfect bridge between dionysus and black swan thematically speaking. Mots7 is so well crafted i could talk about this album for hours
While map of the soul persona was focused on the persona, the facade or the socially acceptable side of yourself you show to the world, the shadow is the deepest part of someone's psyche, filled with raw, hidden desires. The whole Map of the soul series is a deep dive into bts' journey and identity as both artists and humans. Interlude shadow is such a perfect way to break the mask, the persona that was established with the first mots album.
The topic shadow deals with is literally so profound and i can somehow relate a lot to it, because even if it obviously talks about the cost of success and the hardships that come with it, it ultimately deals with the darkest parts of yourself that you struggle to acknowledge and accept. Yoongi has always been really honest about his struggles, he has always described his inner conflicts and psychological issues vividly through his music. He often talks about his greed and desire to be successful and acknowledged, but also about his fear of becoming a monster blinded by his own success ("the greed that used to be my weapon now swallows me, ruins me, and puts a leash around my neck", The last). To me, Interlude Shadow is really multifaceted; it is about the pain and sacrifices you had to go trough in order to achieve your goal but also the delusion and realization that comes with it, as well as the fact that you can never run away from the deepest sides of yourself. There's a really interesting artistic reference in the mv : the red trails on the wall are inspired by anish kapoor's red wax installations, the idea behind that is to show that every time you move forward, you lose a part of yourself.
Interlude shadow is raw, it incorporates rock, orchestral and hip hop elements that make the whole song sound very powerful and emotional. It also samples bts' intro : o!rul8,2, an earlier track which also deals with their identity, dreams and ambition.
Thank you for covering this….ever since it dropped I’ve been obsessed with it’s message and the song the total
I was so in love with this song on release (and still am). It’s one of my favorite solos on MOTS7. However, I guess due to the timing, it was overlooked
wow... this was such a superb video. you somehow put into words practically everything i've ever thought about this song while listening to it. it is so deep, it has so much meaning, and i'm glad it's being recognized. BTS work is truly impeccable, that's why they're not just my favorite kgroup but my favorite group of all time. thank you for your video🙏🏻
so glad you spoke about the masterpiece interlude:shadow is because it does not get talked about enough
I miss 2020, tbh..
Hoping for a day when BTS will get more positive exposure/reaction/review by kpop stan.....btw it's not something they NEED but simply something they DESERVE. The way ppl hate on them literally for breathing is messed up and also those ppl who don't care coz BTS is already SO " FAMOUS" , they have a big fan base so they don't care about hate they get even tho it's more than others if u compare. Ppl love to compare everything but their struggle....like ppl really dismiss their struggle just coz they r famous now. It's stupid if u ask me. All these ppl r hypocrites.
Sorry i rant a bit...just tired and annoyed. Love ur videos hope u make more about BTS music in future.💗
Thank you for this video!
Thank you for this... this is so underrated and my most fav yoongi song...knowing his struggles with everything and how hard he finds it to try to overcome ..the lyrics hit put with the visuals it's amazing and heartbreaking to see xx
"... more tears shed over answered prayers ..."
(St. Teresa of Avila (?))
Thank you for speaking of BTS on your Channel, the video is so good 🫶
Great analysis!
It may sound not connected, but I think of shadow whenever I'm listening to "you never know" by blackpink. There is a beautiful line that says along the lines of the brighter the spotlight becomes the longer my shadow is, when is shining to brightly will I be able to look behind me. I think it goes hand in hand with suga's depiction of how fame can be. The people in the audience only see them under a shiny spotlight, while most time the actors on the stage see close to nothing
I love this so much! Are you planning to make similar videos of Outro: Ego and Intro: Persona?? I would love to hear you on those topics
I think you could have also at least mentioned the analytical psychology aspect, stemming from Jung‘s Map Of The Soul, the source this whole album is built upon.
Was it left out on purpose?
Don’t think it’s necessary since we are discussing the relation to suga as an artist rather than the albums thematics. I mean I imagine you could but that’s not the point of the song.