When BTS released MAP OF THE SOUL: 7 in February 2020, COVID-19 had not yet been declared a global pandemic. Within weeks, the world shifted into lockdown. Tours were cancelled, stages went dark, and daily life narrowed to the confines of home.

In that suspended atmosphere, BTS faced a dilemma shared by many artists: how do you promote new music when the world has stopped moving? On 20 November 2020, their response arrived in the form of BE.

Composed of eight poignant tracks over a runtime of just under 30 minutes, BE – in hindsight – puts the elevated levels of fear and anxiety felt in late 2020 under a microscope. Through their lyrical storytelling, BE glanced inward at BTS’ own feelings in real-time, while also noting the outward-facing needs of their fans and the wider population to craft an album that offers comfort from start to finish.

The album’s title track, “Life Goes On,” serves as its opener, immediately shielding listeners in a warm blanket of reassurance that what they’re feeling is valid and more widely felt than they think. It opens and closes with the same quiet repetition of “I remember” – two words that, in 2020, suggested a bittersweet recollection of life before lockdown. Now, in 2026, those same words take listeners back to more difficult memories of monotonous routines, or a constant underlying sense of worry. 

This track reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and, with its simple candidness, it’s easy to understand why. “One day, the world stopped / Without any warning / Spring didn't know to wait / Showed up not even a minute late” are the opening lines of the first verse – lyrics that paint a vivid image of time passing, despite it feeling like everything paused for months on end. 

At its core, “Life Goes On” acknowledges a difficult truth: time moves forward regardless of whether we feel ready. That message felt almost impossible to accept in 2020, yet its quiet insistence became the song’s strength.

One of the hardest parts of lockdown for many was being forced to face emotions they’d not been able to address before. “Fly To My Room” – a sub-unit track by SUGA, j-hope, V, and Jimin – confronts their frustrations head-on, many of which were shared by listeners at the time. For BTS, it was a time of uncertainty; they had to cancel their highly-anticipated MAP OF THE SOUL World Tour, and weren’t sure when they’d be able to perform for a full audience again. 

As the song goes on, it follows the members as they come to terms with being stuck inside their rooms for days and months on end. “The frustration drives me crazy / Feel like it's still day one” captures the distorted sense of time that defined lockdown, where days blurred together until each one felt indistinguishable from the last. Although this time was largely marked by disappointment and, as SUGA states it, our bedrooms turned into an “emotional trash can,” BTS was able to spend more time deepening their own bonds with one another.

“Blue & Grey” brings the energy down significantly with a guitar ballad focusing on the negative thoughts that come with spending so much time in one room without socialization. Originally intended for V’s solo EP, it has much of the same melancholy that his solo music shares. SUGA’s verse urges an exit to appear soon to free him from his own mind, while the chorus asks: “I just wanna be happier / Am I being too greedy?” Rather than dilute its sadness, the track sits with it. It also encourages listeners to confront their own inner turmoil rather than brush it aside.

What follows is a skit similar to those that appeared on a lot of BTS’ earliest mini-albums which included dialogue between the members, usually relevant to the album’s theme. Here, BTS references their debut at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with “Dynamite” and their varying reactions to such a huge milestone. With this single, released in August of 2020, they became the first Korean act to debut at No. 1, and the honesty with which they discuss this brings listeners into the room with them – close enough to hear how surreal that milestone felt amid physical distance and uncertainty.

That distance is transformed into retro funk hypnotism in “Telepathy,” a track that was created by SUGA and rejected for his solo projects only to be adopted by the group. It’s an upbeat song that breaks down each aspect of not being able to be with ARMY in person in any way while also soothing fans with the idea of the members missing them just as much as they miss BTS. Singing lines like “I feel happiest when I meet you” and “We may be far apart now / But our hearts are still the same” aren’t enough to completely close the distance, but they’re enough to ease a certain level of disconnection that many fans felt toward their favorite artists. 

Where SUGA took the creative reins on “Telepathy,” j-hope’s energy fills the four-minute runtime of “Dis-ease,” an old school hip-hop track that has his sound written all over it. The title is a play on both the uneasiness of the pandemic years and the disease-like feeling of being an artist during this time. j-hope’s rap verse calls insecurity a disease in and of itself, while RM’s and SUGA’s both ask whether it’s themselves or the world as a whole that’s sick. In the end, the negativity only works to push them towards the determination found in the song’s iconic bridge. When Jimin sings “But I don’t wanna mess up / 'Cause life goes on,” it’s a reference to the opening track and a mantra to anyone listening. 

The funky EDM nature of “Stay,” yet another track originally meant for a members’ solo project – in this case Jungkook – brings the album’s energy into new heights. A sub-unit of RM, Jin, and Jungkook join forces to speak directly to ARMY wondering when the next time they’ll be able to see BTS is in a world riddled with uncertainty. Lines like “Was it a dream? / I think I saw you / When I open my eyes / The room's empty again” evoke images of the members daydreaming about reuniting with fans. They state that this period of time isn’t the end of the world, and that the simple act of closing one’s eyes is enough to bring them back together temporarily. 

Closing the album out with “Dynamite” feels like a deliberate attempt to keep the energy high. Its debut at No. 1 on the Hot 100 marked a historic milestone, but its inclusion here also anchors the album in a moment when joy and escapism were urgently needed.

BE functions less as a grand artistic statement and more as documentation. It captures uncertainty without dramatizing it, and comfort without denying hardship. In a year defined by isolation, BTS chose reflection. The result is an album that doesn’t just recall a moment in time, but intensely preserves how that moment felt.