Spring Day (song)

Did You Know?

• "Spring Day" is the longest-charting song on Melon's digital chart to date.
• The song sold 14,000 copies in its opening week in the United States, earning BTS their third number one on the World Digital Song Sales chart.
• BTS performed the song at the 2017 Melon Music Awards alongside "DNA" (2017) on December 2, 2017.

Background and release

BTS's second Korean studio album, Wings, came out in October 2016. It hit number one on South Korea's Gaon Album Chart and became the country's best-selling album of that year. In January 2017, following Wings' success, Big Hit Entertainment announced a reissue called You Never Walk Alone, which would serve as a sequel. When BTS later shared the album's track list, "Spring Day" was confirmed for the reissue. On February 10, 2017, it was named the lead single. Band member RM came up with the main melody between November and December 2016 while walking at Saetgang Eco Park in Yeouido, inspired by dried leaves blowing off trees in the wind. The songwriting credits include "Hitman" Bang, RM, Adora, Arlissa Ruppert, Peter Ibsen, Pdogg, and Suga, with Suga handling production alone. BTS recorded their vocals at Big Hit Studios in Seoul, South Korea. Pdogg, Jeong Wooyeong, and Ibsen engineered the track, and James F. Reynolds mixed it at Schmuzik Studios.

Big Hit Entertainment released "Spring Day" for digital download and streaming in multiple countries on February 13, 2017, as the lead single from You Never Walk Alone. A "Brit Rock" remix came out for free on SoundCloud on June 4, 2018. This remix has the same songwriting credits as the original, but "Hitman" Bang produced it. A Japanese version was recorded and released digitally on May 10, 2017, by Universal Music Japan as a B-side on BTS's seventh Japanese-language single album. That single also included Japanese versions of their Korean singles "Blood Sweat & Tears" (2016) and "Not Today" (2017), and was released simultaneously as a CD single in Japan. KM-MARKIT wrote the Japanese lyrics for "Spring Day." The song later appeared as the tenth track on BTS's third Japanese-language studio album, Face Yourself (2018).

Music and lyrics

"Spring Day" is a midtempo power ballad that blends alternative hip hop, pop rock, Brit rock, and electronic influences. It is set in 4/4 time, in the key of E♭ major, and moves at 108 beats per minute. The song follows a verse-chorus structure: the verses use an Eb–Gm–Cm/Cm7–Ab chord progression, while the chorus shifts to Eb–Gm–Ab–Abm. Its rock instrumentation features keyboards, synthesizer, guitar, and bass. BTS member Jungkook and Arlissa Ruppert contributed backing vocals. The production incorporates EDM synths, thick compressed bass, and piano, along with a "mechanical hissing" percussion and "whining" electronic sounds that create an "enveloping airlock." The track includes rap-breaks, dreamy vocals, and half-spoken deliveries, with the group's vocal range spanning from B3 to B5. The verses are built on dense chords, pain-shredding guitar strums, and whirring synths. A reviewer from The Singles Jukebox noted a similarity between the chord progression and that of Flo Rida's "Wild Ones" (2011).

During a V Live broadcast, RM explained that he wrote the lyrics while thinking of his middle and high school friends he had not heard from in a long time. He compared the song's mood to BTS's 2015 singles "I Need U" and "Run." Lyrically, "Spring Day" uses a seasonal metaphor, portraying longing and separation from loved ones as an "internal winter." The verses employ snow imagery to explore loss, yearning, grief, and moving on, with lines like "I wanna hold your hand / And go to the other side of the earth / Wanna put an end this winter / How much do I have to long for you like snow piles up on the ground / Until the spring days come?" The reference "Like a snowpiercer, I was left alone" nods to Bong Joon-ho's 2013 film Snowpiercer, while "I hate even this moment that is passing by" suggests the ephemerality of life. The lyrics also address "a mature society that can embrace the wounds of others" and touch on mental health and depression. The chorus repeats the line "I want to see you" several times. Toward the end, the song offers comfort and hope for reunion: "No darkness, no season / Can last forever."

Music video

The music video for "Spring Day" was first shown on Big Hit's YouTube channel on February 12, 2017, after a teaser appeared on the same platform three days earlier. Directing duties went to YongSeok Choi from Lumpens, with WonJu Lee as his assistant. HyunWoo Nam of GDW handled the cinematography, while Emma SungEun kim produced the video. HyunSuk Song worked as the gaffer, and JinSil Park was the art director. The shoot took place across three locations: Hwaseong, Yangju, and Gangneung. Two works served as inspiration: Ursula K. Le Guin's 1973 short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" and the film Snowpiercer. Running five minutes, the visual is packed with symbolism and deals with themes of death, the afterlife, and closure.

The video begins with V standing at a snowy railway station, where the signboards are rusty and the slate roof is faded. He steps onto the tracks and bends down to listen for an approaching train. The camera then pulls back to show a train moving through winter, carrying suitcases but no visible passengers. Next, Jungkook is seen sitting inside the train, waiting for someone, while Jimin appears alone on an empty beach. A close-up of RM follows, showing him inside an empty train compartment as the first line of "Spring Day" begins. He runs out of the train toward J-Hope and Suga, who are seated in front of a building with a neon sign reading "Omelas." RM opens a green door that takes him back onto the train, where he passes the compartment Jungkook occupies. Inside the train, he opens another door and enters a room where the other members are celebrating a birthday party, throwing cakes and playing around.