Tourism videos featuring BTS members attract 43 mln views in first week

Two South Korean tourism promotional videos featuring Suga and Jimin of global K-pop sensation BTS have garnered more than 43 million views a week after they were released.

The Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) uploaded two of its four retro-themed music videos, titled “Feel the Rhythm of Korea,” in which the two BTS members introduce tourism attractions in four major cities with iconic songs, on its YouTube channel a week ago.

As of Thursday morning, the first two videos, aimed at promoting Busan and Daejeon, had garnered 22.25 million and 20.86 million views. When a teaser video for the series is included, the series has attracted more than 127 million views. The teaser video has drawn 83.99 million views since it was released on Oct. 14.

Legendary singer Cho Young-pil’s “Come Back to Busan” is the theme song for the southern port city of Busan and rock band Songgolmae’s “A Chance Encounter” is the background music for the central city of Daejeon.

The eastern port city of Pohang’s video, featuring hip hop group Drunken Tiger’s “Do You Know Hip Hop?,” will be released Thursday, and the southern resort island of Jeju’s video, featuring jazz vocalist Park Sung-yeon’s “The Wind is Blowing,” will be uploaded Wednesday.