BTS interview with Sakshma Srivastav | My Ambling Take!

BTS are my first K-Pop boys’ band who I think are incredible to watch. Especially, when they are interviewed with difficult questions cause by extreme fan following. Yet the group intends to be committed to be an inspiration to its listeners.

I love interview of artists. They are people who make their craft seem easy when it is not in reality. Clearly, I felt the interview should have been in Korean so, the interviewee are comfortable. I remember during one of my interview assignment that I interviewed the ground level worker in Tamil.

My Assignment Chitrakulam Report

The class was asked to write a news report on the Chitrakulam Mylapore temple tank in the high of Indian summer in June 2001. I genuinely wanted to do well in my interview and opinion report.

But Vincent D’Souza my reporting teacher gave me a critic on my work. It was harsh but true. Even though it felt emotional it also taught me how a reporter should aim for accurate reporting and research.

That day, I learned a lot from my strict working Professional Editor of Mylapore Times. Newspaper or Media is never easy on you. Fact-checking and true reporting become the heart of journalism. 

During my ESL classes in summer before my fall semester in 2010. Grace Remy was our ESL coordinator. She gave us a task of interviewing three people around the campus or anywhere and make an opinion interview report on topic of our own choice.

So, the next morning I arrived at the main campus around 7 am and sat around the college bench and would polite stop strangers to ask them about Art and its influence in their life.

I got so interested by the number of people who volunteered to answer my questions and there were some who were in rush to go to work. I had prepared six questions and I made shorthand copies of their response and I submitted the longest interview report fear high critic.

My fellow students were from China; the boy will be doing his bachelors in architecture and the girl, my roommate, will be doing a Design program and I was the oldest Ahjumma in the group! I loved working as a team with them too.

My Coordinator was extremely impressed with 10 opinion interviews that had done, but I felt the interview was just pass. If my reporting teacher would have seen it.

K Ramakrishnan sir would have something to say and Vincent sir would have fired me on the spot for not being topic specific and factual. Each question that I asked, and some were based on response I heard.

I wanted to pick one artist and have an in-depth interview with that person on the topic of art and their definition of it. But given that the strangers who I stop to interview were following

• Students taking a break from their artwork
• Office Goers
• Passers-by

What I wish to say here is that, I love to amble along and make my interviewee comfortable and leave them the choice of answering or passing a question. But all my interviewee were happy to answer my preset six questions without any discomfort.     

BTS Interview an Excellent Teamwork

But then, hats off to the interviewer and the interviewee group, for having broken the ice of the first meeting. It had an angled agenda for each question and they were wonderful answers given by the music group. Their response in Korean was lyrical and a good close caption made it enjoyable.

I like the musicality of the world languages. Every members’ tonal quality of their Korean was different. When introduced to Asian faces the mind is not prepared to distinguish between members. It definitely took a long time to figure the group out.

In process of the interview, I memorised the group members and recognise their individuality and facial uniqueness.

Here is the Interview which was for 18 minutes and do watch in the YouTube Channel: 

Titled: BTS ft. Sakshma Srivastav | Indian Interview | E NOW | Exclusive

The questions were a combination of lead questions and personal without crossing the limits. In the Interview group were balanced and focused about their music and emotion behind their lyrics.

BTS being comfortable during the interview was seen in their body language. The group were a bunch of grounded celebrities.

The group that did the research on their albums and formulated the question were good. All my previous BTS interviews, they were speaking in English. While in this interview, they spoke in their mother-tongue seamlessly without feeling super conscious of their diction.

The questions were explained and not curt or snotty. Not speaking the English should not be a limitation to expression and I believe the best thoughts comes in our mother-tongue!

When I found them responding in Korean, I could understand our inert tolerance for diverse languages. RM, kudos for holding the international standard of professionalism and responding in English, you rock in your ESL too!

Usually, Suga is the most uncomfortable and quick to get distracted when interviewed. Contrary to that belief, in this interview, he remained alert. I would have loved to explore some topics about music production.

RM and Jin kept the balance together, while Suga gave off vibes of relaxed calmness, Jimin and J-Hope were cool bright sunshine while V and Jungkook was surprisingly well-behaved, but maybe slightly happy doing their stuff in the end of the interview.

But, initially, the group showed signs of nervousness. But then, recording cuts to the easing into comfort zone. Wonderfully done by the team, behind camera and all department of production of the video.

I had additional questions though:

• Are they comfortable writing lyrics in Korean or English?
• How was experience of writing English lyrics?
• Do they write as a team?
• Are their lyrics for various parts taken over by each member?
• How does it work for them?

Musical Arrangement based questions:

• Are they involved in the composite whole work from writing, to composing, to musical arrangement, to choreographing, to eventually recording the song?
• Do they give input on marketing and package?
• How perfect synchronous dance moves are achieved?

But these questions are too close to their professional secrets, I do not know, but then, we would have loved to know them as humans. In this glamorous profession artist feel the pinch of stress making them heroes of real-life.

Their super hit songs keep topping the chart. These verses catch the imagination of the modern-day youth and the older group too! Kudos to the Team BTS!

RM was honest, when he did not try to paint a rosy picture of the production and performance of the songs. But he did not make it an overemotional response and made it sound professional requirements that the group as a unit achieved together.

J-Hope and Jin such a sunshine on dark spaces. This shined with such ease that I felt I could ask them how they felt being responsible to take charge of the younger members. Because the elder group members take responsibility for the younger ones is such a natural thing in Eastern tradition.

Of course, groups always push each other buttons of tolerance, and get into strife. But the group kept the communication open, while working out their differences over the years.

감사합니다 (gamsahabnida) Team E-Now and BTS it was great coordination. Enjoyed myself listening to the response and interaction.

From Archive: 11 June 2021 and reworked in 9 February 2025

Check out also the Review of Break the Silence, the Movie