Goodbyes are bittersweet. There is goodness in change, but we will never stop missing what ended. As summer strides away, we still want to hold onto its gifts. But autumn’s mellowness has already arrived to take its place and the season must come to a close. We’ve spent these three months on a deep dive through BTS’ music – six songs, six different takes – and, just like the seasons, the finishing chapter is finally here. So, what better way to end this incredible series than with a song that represents endings but also introductions: a prologue to a new chapter.
Released in 2016, "Butterfly (Prologue Mix)" is the fifth track in the album The Most Beautiful Moment in Life: Young Forever – the ending of the HYYH series, but it serves as an opening to the video representing this story. The ballad, produced by Slow Rabbit and "Hitman" Bang and written by "Hitman" Bang, BrotherSu, Pdogg and Slow Rabbit, is a different version of the song "Butterfly" from The Most Beautiful Moment in Life pt. 2, a few minutes longer and without the rap parts. However, what it doesn’t lose from the original track is the melancholy tone that laces the entire song. Its main theme is fear – the fear of loss, the fear of saying goodbye. As one line from Genius' translated lyrics goes: “All of this seems like a dream, don’t try to disappear.”
Still, despite the pleas, there’s a sense of resignation within the lyrics and the vocal performance: the men can’t stop the storm incoming; they can’t refuse to say goodbye to the loved one, they must move on. In that sense, the motif of the butterfly fits perfectly, because it represents this fragile beauty that must leave to survive. Butterflies migrate and fly away in search of food and shelter, they can’t stay in the same place, or else they’ll die. There’s no point in trying to hold on to something that’s inherently free. And we must make peace with that and learn how to free ourselves from a deep fear of loss, even though it hurts.
The song takes us through these reflections with softness. The melody is so sweet that it stings, cradling the listener and never once becoming rough, another point that differs from the original mix. Here, the desperation is mellow, and the grief is already accepted. The drums, slow, mix with an echoey piano and guitar, all backed up by the distant sound of the wind, placing the listener in a beach, in an open field, in a highway, in a place where the grandness swells your heart but shrinks your soul. Pained harmonies paint the song’s ups and downs, and the glass-like vocals from Jin, Jung Kook, V, and Jimin are the finishing touches: they frame everything else around them. The performers' voices are young, and they feel like such. There is an emotional rawness to them that bleeds like the foolishness of youth and the ephemeral nature of it. The lyrics even show this child-like innocence and hope that is starting to slowly crack and break away, giving into maturity: “Don’t say anything, not even a word/Just give me a smile”, “Will you stay by my side? Will you promise me?”. They know it’s an empty request, but the hope of fulfillment stays latent within the words.
Image Credit: BANGTANTV
"Butterfly (Prologue Mix)" ends in an interesting way. The music builds and breaks itself down, leaving the listener with Jung Kook’s verse from the very beginning, but, this time, more whispered, tired, toned down. It’s sudden and those last dragged-out piano keys leave us waiting for something more… a final line or an ending note. But it’s just silence we’re met with. However, there is possibility in this silence. A new start to be constructed from what was a left, a thread to be followed and sewed into something new. It’s bittersweet. We must step into the future. Perhaps we are also the butterfly, flying away with frightening fragility – a butterfly to our loved ones but, most of all, a butterfly to ourselves.
DISCLAIMER: We do not own any audio & visual content in this video except for the editing. ALL RIGHTS BELONG TO THE RIGHTFUL OWNERS. No copyright infringement intended.
Written by: Carol
Edited by: Esma
Checked by: Shelley
