Jin – ‘Happy’ review: BTS star brings joy to the world

15 November, 2024

jin bts happy album review

Read or watch any interview with Jin and you’ll quickly come to feel that happiness is something that’s often not far from his thoughts. It’s a subject the BTS singer touches on often, whether he’s sharing how he wants to present a happy front to the group’s fans instead of showing them the darker feelings he experiences or acknowledging the happiness that those same fans get from supporting the seven-piece.

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It makes perfect sense, then, that Jin’s long-awaited debut solo album takes that keyword ‘Happy’ as its title and runs with it. Over the six tracks that make up the record, he creates a bubble of positivity, filling it up with brightness and levity while acknowledging the shadows and struggles that allow that cheerful spirit to shine harder when it finds you. Even Jin and his commitment to constant joy know you can’t appreciate the light if there isn’t any darkness.

At its core, ‘Happy’ is a record of encouragement – one that promises you can reach that emotional state and finds pleasure in the small moments in life. ‘Running Wild’ – the faintly Christmassy opening song co-produced and co-written by Take That’s Gary Barlow – has visions of a return to giddy times. “We can light it up once more, I’ll take you there,” Jin vows. “We’ll be running wild, love until the sun comes up.” ‘I’ll Be There’, the rockabilly lead single that previewed this album, continues that theme of nudging the listener a few steps closer to sunny days. “Take the ordinary, make it extraordinary,” he instructs at one point, his voice playfully leaping up the scale and back down again.

Where those two tracks deliver buoyant cuts bursting with uplifting energy, ‘Another Level’ drops things into more overcast territory. Gone are the bouncy melodies and vibrant spirit, replaced by heavy guitars and thunderous beats that sound like they’re forcing their way forward against great resistance. As that foundation plugs away beneath him, Jin depicts pushing through life’s struggles as trying to make it to the next level of a video game and reaching for that new chapter.

Promotional material around the record has featured the phrase “You are loved” emblazoned on it, and that attitude colours the second half of the record. ‘I Will Come To You’ closes things out with an earnest piano ballad dedicated to ARMY that captures its creator’s feelings around being separated from his fans. As ever, though, Jin has one eye on the positive, promising his eventual return. “When there’s a warm spring wind, I will come to you,” he sings in Korean at one point before, at the song’s end, delivering a more direct version of that sentiment in English: “If you need me, I will come to you.”

Earlier, before ‘Happy’ reaches its crescendo, ‘Falling’ and ‘Heart On The Window’ top up those feelings of love. The former – which features Japanese band ONE OK ROCK’s Taka and Toru – is a winsome, whistling piece of indie-rock that’s full of desire. The latter – a collaboration with Red Velvet’s Wendy and Jin’s first duet – is the lowkey highlight of the album. It’s a subtle earworm that finds the singers’ voices melting beautifully into each other as they sing of a love that grows “more every minute, more every hour”.

It’s a feeling that reflects the ‘Happy’ listening experience – one where the album ingratiates itself with you more and more with each spin. It’s a record that softly envelopes you in feelings of cheerfulness, kicking the worries of the world aside for just under 20 minutes, Jin effortlessly taking on the role of conductor of joy. “I just hope anyone who likes me is happy,” he told Weverse Magazine in 2021 and ‘Happy’ goes some way to helping make that a reality.