BTS is officially making their return to award shows.
The K-pop superstars will be making a special appearance at the American Music Awards on May 25, the show announced Wednesday morning. The show is being held at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas on Memorial Day. The seven-member group will already be in town for their four sold-out shows at the nearby Allegiant Stadium.
BTS is up for three awards including artist of the year, song of the summer and best male K-pop artist.
A historic trailblazer in the globalization of K-pop, BTS took over the entire heart of their home city of Seoul earlier this year to celebrate their return to the scene after all seven members completed their military service. The group held a large scale live stream show with Netflix, setting it in a historic location in the city, Gwanghwamun.
The choice to stage the comeback performance in front of Gwanghwamun, the main gate and historic entryway to Seoul’s Gyeongbokgung Palace, was no coincidence — as the new album is in many ways a meditation on the group’s cultural identity. The album’s name, Arirang, pays tribute to a treasured Korean folk ballad of the same name, which was famously the country’s first song, sung by Korean men, ever recorded (it was preserved for posterity by American ethnologist Alice Fletcher in 1896).
