Review

Song Review: BTS – Swim

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For many K-pop fans, the past few years have been leading up to this moment. After a long hiatus, BTS have made their much-anticipated return with album Arirang and title track Swim. I can certainly relate to the excitement of a beloved artist returning after a long time away, and if I catapult my mind back to the period between 2014 and 2016 I can also remember how exciting a new BTS comeback can feel. It’s been quite awhile since their music has hit me in that way, but as an avid observer of K-pop history I recognize the importance of this moment and — like everyone else — am beyond curious how new BTS music will sound and what they decide to promote as their big comeback.

Swim‘s almost nonexistent teasers didn’t offer much information about what we were in for. As its release neared, I became more and more convinced the group would opt for a gentle nudge of a return rather than hit listeners over the head. This hunch was largely based on the way pop music works at the moment. Artists – both K-pop and otherwise – don’t really do “grand returns” anymore. Just ask Bruno, Harry or Taylor. The idea of an epic, lay-it-all-on-the-line comeback is just not in style at the moment, which is a huge loss for those of us who love a big statement single. Instead, we’ve got vibes and sentiment, configured as a minimalist ripple that gradually builds over time to enjoy the maximum streaming life possible. This approach can work wonders, but it takes a very special song to do it. BTS know a thing or two about this with their evergreen 2017 classic Spring Day. No doubt they would love to recapture that magic in a bottle, but there’s a reason these songs don’t come around all that often.

Swim is “fine” in the way I’m getting so tired of describing K-pop tracks this year. We’ve got a whole bunch of “fine” already. I’ve got enough “fine” to last me several (very boring) years. What I’d absolutely kill to hear is a piece of music that actively tries to knock our collective socks into the stratosphere. Swim is not attempting to do that, which is… again… “fine.” The song is not obligated to offer anything transcendently new and exciting. But if the biggest K-pop group of our era isn’t going to do that, who will?

At a scant two-and-a-half minutes, Swim doesn’t allow itself much time to expand upon its ideas. Its minimalist chorus forms the backbone. This hook is simple, repetitive and monotone — but not unenjoyable. The verses employ the kind of sung hip-hop that’s become completely inescapable in modern pop music. For a group who was so transformative during their early years, Swim feels overly indebted to trends not of BTS’s own making. What we’re missing is some shot of drama that might give the song’s storyline a sense of rising action. The entire track is quite flat, painting mood without much purpose. I suppose this makes it ideal for looped streaming in the background, but it doesn’t make for a very compelling return. I suspect (and hope) there’s more interesting music on the album, which makes me wonder why the group chose to herald their long-awaited return with something as safe as Swim.

Hooks 8
 Production 7
 Longevity 8
 Bias 8
 RATING 7.75

Grade: C+

46 thoughts on “Song Review: BTS – Swim”

  1. is is the only place I can share my opinion without getting slaughtered by rabbid bts fans😝 so here it goesI have no energy to even write a long review but all I have to say is boring, uninteresting, generic, threadbare, mainstream, and a waste of my damn time. I genuinely can’t fathom why this is the song they chose to promote and No way bts fans waited 4 years for them to come back with the most generic sleepy ass lobotomy music ever. And if you thought this was bad don’t even check out the album…And you know those bts glazers gonna be like “soty guys, bts outdoing all your favs, omg rm breathed he’s so eco friendly! junkookies my husband he only loves me!” One thing I’ll say is that you can hear Kevin parkers( Tame Impala) influence all over merry go round! Anyways, thank you for coming to my Ted talk everyone! ❤️❤️❤️

    No fucks/10❤️🫶

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  2. it’s so boring? i’m not even a mega bts stan but i was expecting a grand return for what has to be the most anticipated comebacks ever and i’m so severely whelmed

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  4. As an ARMY, I’ll be honest, I don’t really know how to feel about Swim. Yes, it’s so nice to hear the boys’ vocals (and raps) again but also, I feel it’s kinda underwhelming for a big comeback title track.

    Some of the b-sides could’ve been better choices given some tweaks ngl; I really enjoyed FYA from the new album.

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    • i agree and im also an army (o_O)… i finished the album and turned on genie by snsd instead cause i needed a song that was actually upbeat (●__●, )

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  6. Same problem I have with most music right now. It might be ok, if they finished it. This whole album sounds like nothing to me including a minute and a half song that is literally nothing. Its just boring Tiktok songs. They’re inoffensive for the 20 seconds its meant to be played for. I just wish they made something that was meant to be played as a full finished album.

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  7. all i can say is that they definitely picked the safest song to be the title track

    there are better songs on the album tho, it might not be for everyone but i enjoyed it

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  8. the fact that this is the album that was advertised as a “deeply reflective body of work” that “explores the group’s identity and roots”…….i need a cigar

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  9. What happened… I was really hoping for either a more melodic song or another hype song banger that BTS is known for and we got this boring material as the track to represent and show how much time we have waited for this moment? The only song on the album I actually kind of enjoy is One More Night which is nearing the end of the album. BTS, please let your work be your work going on (not some westernized shit even if it is just the producers) let your ideas flourish throughout the songs and be the greatest as you are painted to be. 7.5/10 unfortunately.

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  11. naming your album after the most famous traditional folk song of your country and then coming back with a generic English pop song for the lead single 🥴 this has to be one of the worst baits I’ve ever seen. I really thought they’d go back to their roots but I guess we’re still Grammy-baiting.

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  12. I’ve never been a huge BTS fan, but I acknowledge their massive impact and I can also say I’ve enjoyed a lot of their most iconic works. This song is just ok, but it falls short for a main single, especially after this being branded as their grand comeback. On the bright side, promotions will be very strong and these guys are probably going to be everywhere. It just makes me frustrated that this is the type of music they’re going to be delivering.

    And it doesn’t get better on the rest of album, because ARIRANG ranges from “okay-sounding” listenable songs to overproduced tracks that lack a hook or even a nice melody. I would say the second half has better songs, but it also has the most boring ones unfortunately.

    I know this is a BTS review but this comment can perfectly extend to most big third gen groups this year. It is such a sad state to be, with BLACKPINK, EXO and now BTS releasing their worst material in 2026, and BY FAR. All of them have had mid or bad songs in the past, but they all outdid that this year.

    Regardless, I still see BTS’ impact and legacy but it’s sad to see a day like this coming, where their just massively huge despite releasing their worst material so far.

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    • I disagree with BLACKPINK as I found their title track their strongest since Love Sick Girls! I’m obsessed with how it sounds, it’s sweet yet savage.

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  13. Swim is definitely not the comeback banger I was expecting from BTS, and listening to the whole album, I am totally convinced they went with the safest option for a title track. For me personally, I loved body to body and FYA, gave me glimpses of the BTS that was.

    Also, they absolutely used Arirang and its history as a cover for if people come at them for being too westernised, there is little trace of it on the album.

    I love BTS and they are the ones who brought me into Kpop tbh, but nah, if this is the fare i am getting, I better leave the scene.

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  14. comeback bangers are for groups who have something to prove, a has-been artist trying to reclaim some glory… Not BTS. So honestly I’m never surprised by their releases. I’m more interested in their solo work as each member very much are thirsty for a successful career

    7/10 – extremely forgettable.

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    • also at least to me the only notable thing abt this new bts album is that jpegmafia of all artists is a coproducer on it like how tf did hybe manage to score some1 with as batshit n mainstream adverse of a production style as his

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  16. The whole album sounds like a J-Hope solo work, with Like Animals and One More Night as the only notable songs. Swim is not bad at all but it’s oh so meh, as long as I am one of the “Boy With Love/Dynamite/Butter/Permission To Dance Era” Army.

    I was definitely expecting a banger, I understand why they chose to comeback with such a subdued stuff, but I don’t think it’s going to leave any real footprint in their discography apart from the historical event itself.

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  17. I thought it was a pre-release, not a title track >.<

    I’m a kpop baby and have never lived through a BTS comeback, but I have a few songs of them on my playlist. This probably won’t be on it

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  18. The whole album does sound like it was made in LA for sure, with that underlying laid-back tone all over it.

    The title track is the most boring track in a (for me) polished but not very exciting album.The first few songs and the last few songs are the best, but I don’t know that any will make it to my permanent playlist tbh. There are some very nice production choices here and there, but the overall vibe is just not a fit for me.

    I was bracing myself for this since they announced they would be doing the album in LA specifically (I don’t like many LA artists…), so I am not exactly surprised, and I am still very glad to have them back and excited for the tour!!!!

    The pressure must have been insane, so I am just happy the wait is finally over and both them and us can move past the comeback narrative and just get the ball rolling.

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  19. Good review! I had low expectations going in. Certainly wasn’t expecting them to reinvent K-pop or make some big statement. For me it’s a 7.5 currently, which is borderline (and I suspect it’ll go down once the buzz dies down). It sounds fine, as you say. There’s a proper hook at least. The English turns me off as usual, keeping me from giving it a confident add. I like it WAY better than Butter & PTD, so this is progress!

    The album has some decent moments. I’d say it’s on quality tier with MOTS, but flatter, less emotional, more stylish. I’m not that eager to listen again, but it wasn’t bad.

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    • Agreed, this is where the album is the biggest miss for me. I catch glimpses of the emotions in the rapline verses here and there, but I feel like so much English limited their lyricism and, to me, that’s what I personally enjoy the most about BTS: the lyrics and the rapline. While the rapline are all over this (something I hope keeps happening!), having so much of the album be in English constrained them imo, except maybe for RM who is quite comfortable mixing both languages.

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  20. I’ll keep it short…the song (and album) is terrible. They go nowhere. If this were another group I would give it a 5, but BTS has great power and resources, there’s no excuse for this mediocrity. 3/10

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  21. Usually I’m interested in seeing artists experiment, try something new, and to treat comebacks in the kpop sense of the word, not the dictionary meaning. But in this case, it’s nearly impossible to separate this release from the hype and anticipation of this being their big return, and I just feel this title track really doesn’t do justice to the group’s legacy. The marketing pushing this as a return to their roots doesn’t help either – that may be true to some extent for the album as a whole, but this title track, the single that’s supposed to represent the album, is such a dissonant vibe that it really stands out.

    This could have been an Enhypen song (instead of Knife lol) and I’d have nodded and moved on. By itself it’s not a bad song, it’s repetitive and goes nowhere but at least it flows well. But this is still THE BTS comeback song, and so it falls so very short of what I was hoping. This could have been a prerelease for a winter album after the comeback album and it would have been fine, I think, but here it just doesn’t fit.

    Unfortunately BTS do not get to just be artists experimenting on their own time, they are the face of the industry by virtue of their success, and that’s amplified all the more with the way this comeback is being treated (by the Korean government for instance, which of course isn’t on the members themselves). It’s unfair, but it is what it is when you’ve reached such a threshold of success as they already have. I’m sure the weight of their success weighs heavily on them, too, and ultimately it’s up to them to still choose the musical direction they want to go in as a group and that’s fine. But this particular choice of a comeback single is quite baffling.

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    • Adding – Music is about human emotion. The primary aim of vocal music is to evoke human emotion through sound and lyric.

      When the songwriters chose the word “Swim” as the main word to evoke emotion, they immediately limited themselves to a a very narrow range. The “Sw” starts out fine, not the most ordinary consonants and the sss to the ww flows over the lips.

      The the vowel hits, a short i “ih” sound. A singer cannot hold an “ih” sound well at all, it just opens and closes almost before you are halfway through. A long i = eeeee sound is a standard vowel to hold for as long as any singer wants to in any way they want to, short i “ih”, nope.

      Worst is the ending consonant “m” closes the word so quickly and cleanly that the word is not over. Full stop. Now if it had been Switch or Swing or Swift or Swirl or Swish or Swill, all those consonants have something more to them, something that the tongue and lips can hang on.

      Even better, maybe they could have started with the word Swim, then rotated through some of those others to evolve the sound and emotion. Swim – switch – swirl – swish – swift – swing – swim. Give the guys something to work with. But they didn’t, they just stuck with a simple descending two note Swi-im, swi-im which is about all anyone could have done with the word Swim.

      Also, the outside and inside of the boat don’t match. This bothers me, though both outside boat and inside boat are nice.

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  23. I like the instrumental but it feels more appropriate for an intro or interlude, not a title track. I also don’t get much of a sense of personality. In Chapter 2 the members were able to assert themselves through very different kinds of music from each other, but this blends it into a gruel that goes down easy but doesn’t leave much of an impression.

    At this point (not to get too parasocial about it), BTS feels like the person who’s changed so much that you’re no longer friends but you have fond memories of them, are proud of them, and will follow their accomplishments from afar.

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  25. Army here, what I got from the entire album after listening to it a couple of times is that:

    1) it is genuinely different from everything they have released before, and that’s truly difficult to achieve when you have a discography of 250+ songs. Yes I know, “different” doesn’t mean “good” and ppl reading my comment are already rolling their eyes but in that particular sense this album is doing what a new album is primarily supposed to be doing which is adding something new to an artist’s discography. This album objectively does that.

    2) it feels deeply personal, yes, despite the enligh lyrics and the new producers. Listening to it, I can feel that it is *their* album and *their* sound, at this point in their lives. Yes, I know, “personal” as a word very often feels meaningless cause everything can be personal and it is a word that has always been attached to Bangtan’s music to an annoying degree. But after whatever Dynamite-Butter-PTD was, it is important to see that they still manage to stay true to, perhaps, the most quintessential premise of their work.

    3) A stronger title track was needed. This track is weak as a standalone.

    4) The album benefits from listening to it from top to bottom and treating it as an ensemble. It is cohesive and yet surprising at times. Of course if you go into it as a fan of synth pop

    5) When coming across an artistic product of any kind, it is always very important to meet it where it’s at and judge it in its context and not outside of it. Of course if your preferred kind of pop music is 80’s synthpop and your go-to kpop is the second gen electronic sound, you’re not going to like this album or this sound. It is not for you.

    6) The same thing goes for any comparisons between an artist’s older work and their new work, because you always have to meet an artist where they’re at instead of endlessly comparing them to their past self or to an imaginary sound you expected in your head. If you watch Barry Lindon after A Clockwork Orange expecting a disturbing hard hitting jaw dropping crime film, you are bound to be disappointed. That by itself doesn’t make Barry Lindon a bad movie though. If you go into Arirang expecting to listen to the kind of angst fuelled hype tracks that Bangtan made when they were 18 to 20 years old on a limited budget and knife to the throat, you’re gonna be disappointed. They are not the same people anymore. This is a different time and a different sound.

    7) Now a comment about the discourse here, and generally: BTS are the face of Korean music but that doesn’t mean you have to like them and it’s totally okay if you don’t. It is totally okay if you believe that your favorite artists are more deserving of their success. I feel that so much resentment and whining would have been avoided if people just went on with their day instead of writing thinkpiece after thinkpiece for years now about an act they fundamentally dislike and have disliked for some time (yes I am also writing a thinkpiece but this is my favourite group, so there’s a difference). I suggest you just, listen to the music you actually like instead of trying to force yourself into liking sth you don’t just because it has commercial success. If you think BTS are undeserving of their success and have become an annoying monopoly in (k)pop, the only way out of that is to find the kpop act that *you* think is better and give them all the spotlight. You will soon realise that it is not that easy to find an act that can inspire to so many people the kind of emotion that Bangtan did in their 13 yo career. It will happen, but not anytime soon for sure, perhaps not in our lifetime.

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  27. i listened to 5 songs of the album and stopped ….what is this ?? how did we go from ON , RUN BTS , IDOL to ….this , also the problem with making mostly English songs that lyrics come into focus like how did 5 or 6 people write every song >>>>most disappointing release of a very underwhelming year so far

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  28. It’s incredibly boring. It just seems to have referenced songs by Western artists; it’s neither K-pop nor BTS-like, and completely lacks originality. Personally, I’d give it a 5 out of 10.

    It’s too early to judge based on just this one song, but it seems K-pop is no longer a genre that the general public listens to, but rather something enjoyed by those who are fans of idols.

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  29. well, now im afraid for txt’s album. it surely wont go in the western/ballad/radio/boiled unseasoned chicken breast direction…right?

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  30. imo a mediocre album. none of the songs were notably bad or anything – I can understand the appeal – I just felt none myself from any track

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