BTS' album 'MAP OF THE SOUL: PERSONA' returns to No. 1 of iTunes album charts after 7 months after release

[Courtesy of Big Hit Entertainment]

SEOUL -- "MAP OF THE SOUL: PERSONA", a BTS album released in April this year, reclaimed the top spot on iTunes's top albums chart in 39 countries including France, Germany and Russia after fans rallied to buy the band's digital album, reacting against the result of an American pop-culture award event.

The unusual movement by ARMY, the band's international fan club, began at midnight Monday (1500 GMT), a day after K-pop girl band BLACKPINK won three awards at "E! People's Choice Awards (PCA)", an annual pop-culture award event hosted by American cable TV channel "E!" on Monday.

ARMY claimed that BTS should have taken at least one award at the event because the boy band led Twitter votes in all three categories.

"Does PCAs really think we don't keep track of our own stats?! Well, thus that certain rule so they can give it to whoever they want to disregarding the TRUE people's choice!" said "Wonn_twt", a Twitter user. Another user "El MariaJIN" said "Wait...wait...wait...did BTS just lose the BEST GROUP award to Blackpink?."

Fans think it's meaningless to protest. Instead, they used a hashtag, a keyword tag, "#BuyPersonaOniTunes" to promote their campaign of expressing support by purchasing albums. Currently, "#BuyPersonaOniTunes" is the 20th trending hashtag on Twitter as of 10:30 a.m. Tuesday.

Park Sae-jin swatchsjp@ajunews.com

BTS' album 'MAP OF THE SOUL: PERSONA' returns to No. 1 of iTunes album charts after 7 months after release

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