A powerful note quivers, suspended in time, before more strings join the growing crescendo of heavy, lulling music, dragging you underwater, only to show you a picture most terrifying— a swan with beautiful black wings, dark as midnight, quivering at the bottom of a lake. Gasping, trying to swim upwards to air, struggling and flapping its wings wildly, but to no avail. Each moment that passes the swan seems to become weaker, consumed in the growing haze and disorientation caused by a lack of oxygen. Its cries are muffled, body shaking as it slowly loses the tension in its muscles, succumbing to the overwhelming feeling of water burning its lungs.
The swan is the artist and the water is the art, taking the artist piece for piece until the swan doesn’t exist anymore, just a shivering, living corspe of the grand bird it used to be. It used to rule the water, gliding the surface, and now the water is reigning over its life force, snatching any semblance of identity the swan had left.
The image, horrifying as it is, is the manifestation of the very real fear any artist has of losing themselves to their art, being so utterly overtaken by what they create that they lose the why of creating in the first place; they lose the passion, the fire they had within themselves, extinguished by the water dragging them to the bottom of the lake, where all creativity is exhausted. Where everything has been explored, where there’s nothing left to learn. Where no matter how hard you try, you can’t find the love you used to have for your what you do. Where it’s no longer art for you, it’s a chore.
Black Swan by BTS is the introspective masterpiece that talks about this very struggle an artist faces, which most musicians have hardly ever done. Of course, there’s always the one song about the perils of fame in any respectable artist’s discography, and it’s hard for a 17 year old blogger to sit behind the screen and say it’s invalid, but there’s a very clear distinction between the perils of fame and the perils of passion; in Black Swan, fame is seen as the metaphorical cherry on top of the bitter cake that is losing the essence of your art. This song is much more existential, a questioning of what the very purpose of an artist is, rather than the pondering on how fame tinkers with this purpose. At its very core, Black Swan is an (ironically) artistic rendition of pure, unadulterated loss — not the loss of a loved one, not the loss of an opportunity, none of that. No, this is unadulterated loss for the simple fact that the only person losing is the artist, and the only reason for this very loss is the artist. It’s a full circle — what the artist once loved, once lived for, once breathed for, is the very thing that makes “the heart stop beating”, in the words of SUGA.
In fact, the loss of direction and purpose caused by this very, one could say, dowsing of fire in the heart, is displayed in the first words of the song — do your thang, do your thang with me now, what’s my thang? what’s my thang, tell me now — it’s the ambling around of a person whose eyes first lit up with glowing embers of love and drive, passion and determination, but whose very eyes now stay dark, unable to light the path of purpose the artist had first set off upon. What was the very thing that made them fly, that made them soar? They can’t remember.
The heart stops beating when the music starts to play
This isn’t just a powerful line, it’s a worrying one coming from SUGA. One of the greatest producers of his time, nicknamed Hand Of Midas, he turns every track he touches into a masterpiece, simply because of his passion for music and his consequent expertise. When a man who’s been writing music since he was 11 says that very music makes his heart stop beating, it’s a jarring wake-up call to everybody who watches BTS’ success and thinks they must be having fun. It must be easy, people think, doing what you like and earning off of it, but the simple fact remains that when it’s your livelihood, it becomes a trap. It becomes something you resent, and that — the bitterness for something you used to love — is the most gruelling, terrifying emotion you can experience as a creator, as an artist. The moment when you pause, when you look down at your hands and loathe what they’ve made, when you slowly realize you can’t escape this trap you’ve gotten yourself into, because you have nothing of yours except the art you bring to life, the very art you’ve started to find repulsive.
If this can no longer hold, my heart will stop beating… But what if that moment’s right now?
RM adds to SUGA’s depressive contemplation, wondering if this is the very moment he breaks, the very moment he decides he’s had enough. Is this the moment where he gives up, after years of soldiering through hell and back? That’s the thing, that’s what makes this track so heart-wrenching — it’s knowing that BTS has made it through so much to do what they love, only for there to come a point where what they love is holding them in a chokehold, forcing them to keep going when they’re burned out. RM is tired, he’s stripped to the bone of his determination, so where can he turn now?
No tune affects me anymore; [I’m] weeping a silent cry
This is one feeling most people with mental health issues can relate to extremely — the lack of feeling, the terror of being numb. V and Jimin chime in and say they’re now numb to the only thing that made their heart come alive, and they’re crying out for someone to come and help. But the lake is devoid of life, and the swan suffers silently, sweeping its gaze hither-tither to search for someone who sees it, but nobody comes. It’s just the swan, the water, and the slow realization that the once majestic bird is now drowning in the very thing that sustained it.
Then comes the chorus, quiet but desperate, where the vocal line says to “film it now, film it now”, which I intepret as sarcasm, as strange as it might sound. It’s a sort of rheotorical demand, a statement made for the listener to feel guilty, said with intense spite that hides an urgent cry for someone to listen to what they need, to help them instead of shoving cameras in their faces.
There’s vivid imagery of drowning throughout the song, with J-Hope saying he’s “going deeper” and SUGA saying the “darkness in waves brings agony”, but with the line “I’ll never give up” following right after, there’s an idea of fighting back, of striving towards that passion and love once again, that’s gently introduced into the mix. For where there is fear there is hope, and when you’re scared of losing something, it means you haven’t lost it yet. The metaphor of adrenaline returning to the swan’s limbs in a last bout of hysteric strength becomes clearer when the second pre-chorues contrasts the first — in the first pre-chorus, Jungkook and Jimin sang about their heartbeat slowing and everything turning hazy, whereas in the second pre-chorus, Jungkook and Jin sing of their heartbeat racing in their ears, eyes blowing wide open.
Nothing can defeat me, I shout out with ferocity
Perhaps the most potent line of the entire song, here there’s an established end that’s hopeful, something the listener doesn’t expect. Here, the swan raises its head one last time, spreads its wings, and pushes itself off the ground. It remains to be seen whether it reaches the surface, but the premise is set. The hope is cemented, the possibility of the fire crackling in the hearth of devotion for art is reborn. The determination has returned, for the artist refuses to part with their art that easily. Refuses to stop breathing.
For this very reason, Black Swan isn’t just a song — it’s a near-death experience. Every suspension of the beat, every word sung by BTS, every note that quivers on string lends itself to stealing the breath away of the person listening, making them feel as if they’re drowning right alongside the artists in the song. These very elements return breath back into the listener in the end though, refusing to let themselves die, refusing to give up hope. For this very reason, how much ever Black Swan deserves global recognition, it needs none. The fact that it exists is enough of an accomplishment for BTS. This will be a work of art that will persist in its relevance, in its personal and cultural impact, for centuries to come. I would expect nothing less.
