The Wall Street Journal - 09.03.2020

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. Monday, March 9, 2020 |A

Mr. Oates: My chorus was about a

girl who had come and gone.

Daryl’s verses were about lost

love. We always took a universal

subject and personalized it so

someone listening could absorb it.

Mr. Hall:Aftermymarriagefell

apart, I felt awful and it showed:

“Get up in the mornin,’ look in

the mirror / I’m worn as a tooth-

brush hangin’ in the stand / My face

ain’t lookin’ any younger / Now I

can see love’s taken her toll on me.”

When we went into Atlantic

Studios in mid-’73 to record

“Abandoned Luncheonette,” I

played two measures of the “She’s

Gone” intro for producer Arif Mar-

din. “That’s wonderful,” he said.

GETTY IMAGES (2)

WHEN HALL & OATES first re-

leased “She’s Gone” in 1973 on At-

lantic, the single only reached No.

60 on Billboard’s pop chart.

Two years later, the duo moved

to RCA and released “Sara Smile,”

which became a No. 4 hit. Eager to

capitalize, Atlantic reissued “She’s

Gone,” which climbed to No. 7 in ’76.

Recently, Daryl Hall and John

Oates looked back on the heart-

breaks that led to the song’s cre-

ation. The duo will tour North

America this spring and summer.

Edited from interviews:

John Oates: I wasn’t in love with

our Manhattan neighborhood

when Daryl and I moved up from

Philadelphia in 1972 to gig and re-

cord for Atlantic. We lived in a

second-floor apartment on 82nd

St. and York Ave. I wished we lived

in Greenwich Village instead. A lot

more was going on downtown, and

I was often there at clubs.

One night in the Village, I ended

up at the Pink Teacup on Bleecker

St. at 2 a.m. After I was seated, in

came this gal in a pink tutu with

cowboy boots but no coat. We

started talking. She said her name

was Freddy Littlebird. Hey, it was

the early ’70s.

I asked her if she wanted to get

together that Sunday night on New

Year’s Eve. She said yes, so I gave

her my address. Daryl was going

to be away that weekend.

But Freddy never showed.

Bummed, I sat on our sofa strum-

ming my guitar. Maybe she forgot or

lost the address. Or found something

better to do. Or maybe, like me, she

didn’t care for the Upper East Side.

Either way, Freddy wasn’t com-

We went forward and recorded it.

For the session, Arif pulled to-

gether great studio musicians—

bassist Steve Gelfand, drummer

Bernard Purdie, percussionist

Ralph MacDonald and saxophonist

Joe Farrell. Guitarist and key-

boardist Chris Bond came with us.

Mr. Oates:Purdie set the pace

when he counted off the tempo for

“She’s Gone.” He’s so good that

whatever he played that day was

going to be perfect.

Mr. Hall:How we ended the song

wasn’t planned. John and I just

started exchanging “She’s gones,”

like a call and response. It just felt

right when we started doing it.

In 1975, John and I moved to

RCA. But our first album for the

label confused people. We ap-

peared to have makeup on, so peo-

ple didn’t know what we were—

glam, disco, rock, R&B, straight,

gay. Now I look back and I’m

proud we were shattering people’s

perceptions. When the single of

“Sara Smile” became huge, Atlan-

tic reissued “She’s Gone.” This

time it went to No. 7.

We had just entered our I-told-

you-so period. As for Bryna, I’m

guessing she knew “She’s Gone”

was about us. But I wouldn’t know.

When we separated, we didn’t

keep in contact.

Mr. Oates:After Freddy stood me

up, I saw her here and there in the

Village. I never asked her why she

didn’t show New Year’s Eve. By

then, Daryl and I were touring.

Talk about she’s gone—I was gone.

The past didn’t matter much to me.

Wurlitzer electric piano and

played the keyboard lick you hear

on the record’s intro.

John and I pooled our romantic

sorrows, and I began coming up

with lyrics for the verses. My mar-

riage was dissolving, and everyone

I knew was telling me not to

worry, that I was going to be all

right. None of that was helping:

“Everybody’s high on consola-

tion / Everybody’s trying to tell

me what is right for me.”

My family was religious and we

had attended a progressive Meth-

odist church. That’s where I sang

and learned about show biz:

“My daddy tried to bore me

with a sermon / But it’s plain to

see that they can’t comfort me.”

ing. She was gone. So I

started singing a folky re-

frain about being stood

up that sounded like a

good chorus for a song:

“She’s gone / I better

learn how to face it /

She’s gone / I’d pay the

devil to replace her /

She’s gone / What went

wrong?”

A day or two later,

Daryl returned. I told him

the story about Freddy. He laughed.

I said, “Check this out” and played

him the “She’s Gone” chorus.

Daryl Hall:In 1972, my first wife,

Bryna, and I separated. We had

married in 1969 but the relation-

ship wasn’t working. It was a ro-

mantic shock period for me.

When I returned to New York,

John played me the chorus of a

song he was working on. As he

strummed and sang “she’s gone,”

the song was folky with the feel of

Cat Stevens’s “Wild World.”

I liked it, but I’m much more

R&B. I said, “Let’s try it in another

groove.” I sat down at my

ELLEN POPPINGA/K & K/REDFERNS/GETTY IMAGES

Daryl Hall and John Oates performing in 1977, after ‘She’s Gone’ became a hit.

ANATOMY OF A SONG| MARC MYERS

Hall & Oates on the Breakups Behind ‘She’s Gone’

F

or the Korean boy

band BTS, the success

of its sprawling, genre-

defying pop album

“Map of the Soul: 7” is

a sign of how the ris-

ing K-Pop act is cementing its

place in American culture.

Earlier this month, the album hit

No. 1 in the U.S. on the Billboard

200, the band’s fourth chart-topper

in about a year and nine months.

It’s a success story that defies

conventional wisdom about the

kinds of music Americans will tune

into—not least because the songs

are mostly sung in Korean.

In the two years since BTS broke

through stateside, becoming the first

K-Pop act to top the U.S. album

chart, BTS has sold outU.S. stadi-

ums, graced “Saturday Night Live”

and performed with Lil Nas X at the

Grammy Awards. (Recently, the band

canceled some South Korean con-

certs because of the coronavirus.)

Even among the many K-Pop

acts with loyal fan bases, BTS

stands out. Here, seven reasons

why the seven-member band is

finding global success.

1

Pop’s Big Decade: BTS, whose

name stands for “Bangtan So-

nyeondan”—which has been trans-

lated as “bulletproof boy scouts”—

didn’t come from nowhere. It built

upon—and arguably transcended—

the growth of K-Pop, which is pop-

ular outside South Korea, espe-

cially in Japan, and started gaining

traction in the U.S. in the late

1990s and 2000s with acts like Big

Bang and, later, Psy (“Gangnam

Style”). Crucial to its rise is the

stewardship of Bang Si-hyuk, the

CEO of Big Hit Entertainment, the

group’s label and agency. (Repre-

sentatives of Big Hit declined to be

interviewed.)

2

K-Pop Is About Highly Orches-

trated Perfection. BTS Is Not:

The difference with BTS, K-Pop ex-

perts say, is that

Big Hit granted

the septet un-

precedented per-

sonal and cre-

ative freedom,

resisting the im-

pulse to write

their music,

script their every

move and micro-

manage their so-

cial-media pres-

ence. Mr. Bang

“perceived that

the appearance

of artists being

too managed by

the agencies was

hurting the art-

ists,” says Cedar-

Bough Saeji, a

visiting assistant professor at Indi-

ana University Bloomington who

teaches Korean studies. BTS is

heavily involved in the writing,

production and choreography of

their music, videos and dances.

This gives them credibility among

music fans—especially in the

West—who feel like many K-Pop

acts are manufactured.

3

They Can Rap: A key reason for

BTS’s perceived authenticity is

that the group has convincing rap-

pers. “BTS began their career as an

independent hip-hop band, rather

than the typical ‘idol bands’ man-

5

They’re Clean—Even For a K-Pop

Act: K-Pop has a reputation for

being squeaky clean. Agencies keep

a tight leash on their charges’ per-

sonal lives. (That is why the recent

sex scandals in the industry

shocked people.) While BTS mem-

bers are more open about their

lives, they don’t cultivate a “bad-

boy” image by, for example, having

imagery in videos that some might

consider sexist, Ms. Saeji says. BTS

is “clean on a whole new level,” she

says, with a focus on songs about

self-acceptance and mental health.

6

YouTube and Streaming Help

BTS Evade Gatekeepers: In the

age of streaming, new platforms help

K-Pop groups directly connect with

potential fans instead of going

through the machinery of the tradi-

tional music industry.

At the same time, like many acts

popular on various platforms BTS

feeds the digital beast: It puts vocal

and dance practices on YouTube, re-

leases music (including rap mixtapes)

on SoundCloud for free and have

video chats with fans. “It’s a never-

ending cycle of entertainment,” says

Chris Brown, a 42-year-old fan in

Jacksonville, Fla. While language bar-

riers may have once presented a hur-

dle—BTS’s music is mostly in Ko-

rean—fans quickly make translations

and circulate them globally.

7

They’ve Created Their Own Uni-

verse: Some music critics say

much of BTS’s output is flat, formu-

laic or derivative. But fans say a lot

of thought is put into BTS’s music,

which is full of interconnections and

self-referential allusions. The lyrics

in the new song “Black Swan,” for

example, refer to a track from their

debut album, “2 Cool 4 Skool.” On-

line, there are videos with theories

about the fictional story line that

runs through their albums, Mr.

Brown says. And unlike most bub-

ble-gum pop, the music is ambitious,

high-minded and daring, Ms. Saeji

says, invoking inspirations like psy-

choanalyst Carl Jung and German

novelist Hermann Hesse.

aged and controlled by the enter-

tainment agency,” says Lee Gyu-

tag, assistant professor of

anthropology at George Mason Uni-

versity’s South Korea campus.

BTS’s ascent dovetails with the

growing popularity of hip-hop in

South Korea. In the U.S., mean-

while, rap now dominates U.S. pop

music more than ever.

4

BTS Rule Social Media—And Their

Fans Have Clout: BTS has spent a

record 168 weeks at No. 1 on Bill-

board’s Social 50 chart, which tracks

popular artists on Facebook, Twitter,

Instagram, YouTube and Wikipedia—

currently above Justin Bieber, Lil

Nas X and Billie Eilish. “It’s insane,”

says Dave Bakula, head of music ana-

lytics and insights at Nielsen Music,

which supplies data to Billboard’s

charts. BTS fans “are passionate to a

level that you see very rarely.” That,

in turn, translates into action: CD

purchases, streams and online post-

ings. Ms. Saeji says BTS fans in

richer countries have donated

money to those in poorer countries

to help them buy recordings to im-

prove BTS’s ranking on charts.

Its strategy of being approach-

able helps too, experts say. K-Pop

stars have long worked to present

an idealized image on social media.

But BTS doesn’t represent “distant

perfection,” Ms. Saeji says. The ef-

fect, Ms. Saeji says, is a kinship be-

tween fan and artist.

BYNEILSHAH

n ‘Map of the Soul: 7’ (2020)

422,000 ‘equivalent-album’ units

in the U.S. in its first week

Key song: ‘UGH!’

n ‘Map of the

Soul: Persona’

(2019)

230,000 units

Key song:

‘Boy With Luv

(feat. Halsey)’

n ‘Love Yourself: Answer’

(2018)

185,000 units

Key song: ‘Anpanman’

n ‘Love Yourself: Tear’ (2018)

131,000 units

Key song: ‘FAKE LOVE’

Note: Units include album sales, track

sales and streaming.

Source: Billboard magazine

BTS’S Four Chart-Toppers

At top, the seven members of the K-Pop group BTS.

Below: Fans at 102.7 KIIS FM’s Jingle Ball 2019.

What’s Driving BTS Mania?

Seven reasons South Korea’s seven-member K-Pop band is an American phenomenon

LIFE & ARTS