Before the release of his debut album D-Day under the name Agust D, SUGA of BTS released the song People Pt. 2. This song is a duet with IU, an artist he had worked with on the hit song Eight. I've been missing Yoongi since he enlisted so I thought it would be great to write a post on his music. Let's do a deep dive into People Pt. 2!
Original Title
In his interview with Billboard, Yoongi said the original title was 사라 (Sara). He added this is because the word is ‘사람 (saram = people)’ or ‘사랑 (sarang = love),' depending on the consonant at the end. It would be up to the listener to decide. There were concerns of misinterpretation so they chose to call it People Pt. 2. I liked that the original title was ambiguous, it was very clever. But I also understand why they had to change it.
That Chorus
The first time I heard the song, IU’s opening part/chorus was something that made me stop and think. I immediately felt that this was a part I had to think about to understand. My first thought was that there was some form of wordplay going on. It was disappointing that people were criticizing Yoongi for it. People were saying that his English was all wrong. I disagree with that idea. He would not use the words he did without any specific intention or purpose to it.
My Thoughts on The Lyrics
Yoongi once said that he leaves it to the listeners to interpret his music so l want to do that and give it my best shot. Allow me to interpret this song from my point of view and life experience:
So time is yet now, right here to goI know, you know, anything does knowSo time is yet now, right here to goNobody doesn’t know anymore
For me, those lines mean that time (and life) is yet -- as in not yet -- but it is also right here and now. The part that talks about everyone knows but nobody knows at the same time felt like a sense of frustration to me. Time and life are not happening but it is. We know that, but at the same time, we don’t. Given that he wrote these lines during the pandemic, to me it showed a feeling of anxiety. It could be anxiety about how life stood still but time was still moving. I'm sure everyone felt that during the pandemic. The song was saying how nobody knew what exactly was going on and how to deal with it.
Yoongi’s words in this song made me feel for him. I could not help but wonder about how lonely he seemed to feel when writing it. It especially felt bad to listen to him say that maybe love is momentary, that love is conditional. It made me wonder what happened to make him think and feel that way. I am not saying that love is perfect. But for him to believe in that definition of love, that's sad. It makes me wish that he'd receive and feel all the love that he deserves in his life which would help change his mind.
We all deserve love, and it is not conditional. I don’t believe that. And it is not momentary. We may lose the ones we love, that’s the way life is, but that love will always be there if it was love. I say this not as a naive young person. I say it as someone who has loved and lost and learned about what love is and should be for me in my life. We all deserve to know and feel that.
The line that said forever is like a sandcastle and that it crumbles easily? I get that. As we say in Tagalog, “Walang forever (There’s no forever).” There may not be forever. We may love and lose the people we care about. But we should take the chance to love the heck out of these people. We should enjoy the love they share with us while we have the chance. Loss may be sad, but dreading and anticipating that loss, and avoiding love to prevent that is even sadder.
How do we take a chance at love if we are already dreading losing them from the start? Why not free fall with that feeling and see where it goes? As cliche as it sounds, it is still better to have loved and lost than not to feel love at all. To have not known it is the biggest tragedy.
The lines where he mentioned how not being loved enough as a child made him cautious moved me. The line saying he wanted a sincere connection despite his childhood was relatable. If you haven’t felt that love from your family, it would be difficult to recognize it in others. You wouldn't know how to share that kind of love with others as well. You want to connect but you’re not sure how. I’m not saying that’s how he feels but I’m saying this from my point of view. You can have all the love in the world for other people. They may have all their love for you in return but there will still be something holding you back. There will be a hesitation and an uncertainty. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I have faith that given the right people, you can find the love you need. The kind of love that opens you up to the possibilities. A love where this hesitation and uncertainty is something that you can overcome.
There were two parts of the song that I felt were a nod to a couple of his previous songs. One was the part where he sang a line from his song So Far Away. Another was a part that reminded me so much of his song Seesaw:
The us that dreamt of a future together is no more
We're the ones who tore down the sand castle
They say there are no winners or losers in this game
But I'm always the loser
We said we'd give our all, but we tore it all down
And then we leave
Because both love and people are selfish.
I know the lines are different but the general idea or feeling struck me as the same as Seesaw. Even in the lines that follow, where he talks about the end of love, a love that passed…it reminds me of that song.
There was a question if love is perfect on its own in the song. Is it? Now that is an interesting question. For me, the answer to that is no. Loving someone is a choice. And with that choice comes commitment. It is about opening yourself up and being vulnerable to another, among other things. But that’s something that I will share more about in a future post (maybe).
I hope that the Seesaw-like part was only a story and not coming from personal experience. It is too sad if the basis of this was something real. But if it is, I want to say to Yoongi (and whoever else feels this way): You are not always the loser. In a way you win because the love you lost is giving you room to find the love that you deserve. And yes, people may be selfish, but I refuse to believe that real love is. You’ll find that love if you open your eyes to it. Trust that it will come to you one day when you least expect it. Love may not be perfect, but it is worth it. I have faith in that.
There’s a part in the song that people have said might be about his love for his craft, his love for his career, and ARMY. I agree with that one.
Selflessness can be selfish, too, it's true
It's my greed when I say that it’s all for you
Will I be happy if I give up my greed
A half-illusion that can never be fulfilled
Selflessness can be selfish, too, it's true
It's my greed when I say that it’s all for you
Will I be happy if I give up my greed
A half-illusion that can never be fulfilled
I remember Yoongi talking to Jin on In the Soop about how sometimes he regrets working too hard. I’ve also heard him say somewhere else that he feels greedy for wanting to do so much. The idea seems to be that he felt that his love for ARMY is the reason he does what he does, which is why he called it selfless. But it is also selfish because, as I said, he feels greedy for wanting to do and achieve so much. He wonders if he’ll be happy if he gives it all up, but he calls it a half-illusion that cannot fulfill. This might be because, most likely, he could never imagine giving it up anyway. Not that anyone would want him to.
They say life's a struggle between resistance and submission
I say it's a struggle against loneliness
If you can't hold it back, it's okay to cry
You're already more than enough to be loved
That part made my heart want to reach out to him and comfort him. It all felt so sad and lonely. I have felt that way myself. I understand the part about resisting and then submitting to life. I understand how it feels when you’re struggling with loneliness. For me, this is about resisting the act of settling in life because you feel lonely. It's about struggling with giving in because you feel so alone. You wonder if you should settle. You sometimes feel you’re worth waiting for the right person, people, or time in your life. But as the song goes, it’s OK because you are already more than enough. We have to believe that.
Yoongi said that “loneliness is being together in modern society.” That reminded me of a line from the show Ally McBeal. She said, “The truth is, when I think back on my loneliest moments, there was usually somebody sitting there next to me.” That's something that I find myself thinking about a lot.
As I said earlier, sometimes we settle. We surround ourselves with people, but they are not always the right ones. We fool ourselves into thinking that would make us less lonely but in truth that makes us even more lonely. I can’t argue that we don’t all have that loneliness inside us as Yoongi says in his interview. Despite that, I can say that being around the right people helps. Surround yourself with people you can trust and talk to. People you can be yourself with, even if it means sitting together in silence. It doesn’t always mean you’ll feel less pain or sadness, but you will be with people who will help you through it. The comfort of knowing there is someone there who has your back is enough. Or at the very least it helps to give you some relief or comfort.
I loved this song a lot and I can’t stop talking about it. I enjoyed the music video, but I don’t want to go into it so much. It’s a great video of Yoongi as he reflects on the song and goes about his creative process. It's more of a fan service video to me (except for the last part where he explains how he felt about the song). There's nothing more to review about it. I’ll go into the other songs on the D-Day album in future posts. I’ll end it here for this one with the live version of Yoongi and IU singing the song on IU's Palette:
The difference in the sound of this single from his previous Agust D songs was surprising, but I love it. After all the anger and the pain I felt from his previous albums, he has grown a lot. He is more contemplative about his thoughts and words. For an easy-listening and light-sounding song, this was a track that was heavy with the feelings for me...and I love it.
I’m very happy with his growth as an artist: as a songwriter, a producer, a rapper, and a singer. Whenever I listen to his songs, I see him as a person who feels a lot and holds a lot of things close to his chest. He has a lot of heart and as an artist, I'd love to see him explore that even further. I hope that I see more of that growth in the years to come.
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