BTS and Halsey: How the stars of the 2019 Billboard Music Awards became BFFs

'I think we both have this conceptual thing that we really like to do'
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Margaret Abrams23 May 2019

BTS and Halsey's iconic friendship has given their ARMY of fans plenty to celebrate.

Halsey and BTS absolutely smashed their hit single “Boy With Luv” at the 2019 Billboard Music Awards and she surprised the group at their Met Life Stadium show in New Jersey. Halsey, born Ashley Frangipane, is originally from New Jersey so it was quite the homecoming.

Based on their Instagram and Twitter feeds they're celebrating their friendship with a bit of matching bling.

While the rest of us are lucky to receive beaded friendship bracelets from Claire's, celebrities are doling out far superior accessories to their best friends. Ariana Grande famously gifted her squad with seven Tiffany & Co. rings and now Halsey, who’s a friend of the “thank u next” singer, provided the most famous K-Pop group in the world with blinged out bracelets.

Halsey posted a quick Instagram video with a shiny pink bracelet along with “finally got to give these to everyone.”

No, she didn’t hand one to her current significant other, British pop-punk singer Yungblud. Instead, they went to her best friends, the ultra-talented boys of BTS, to show her post-collab love ahead of the Billboard performance.

Halsey stopped by Capital FM to discuss her long-term friendship with the band. “It was really, really a long time coming,” she said about the collaboration. “I met the guys a couple years ago and just kind of connected with them right away. I think a lot of people can be intimidated by a language barrier but I knew it was really important to me to kind of just talk to them the same way I would anyone else."

"I think in a time when they were exploring a new avenue, I think it meant a lot to them that that I treated them like any other friend and it meant a lot to me that they did the same...they were friends of my music and I was a huge fan of theirs. Despite growing up in different places and coming of age in two different types of music industries the one thing we really found in common was we love our fans, we love making visually stunning, exciting art that gets everyone excited, so it was kind of just like a matter of time before we did the collaboration," the "Without Me" singer said.

We thought their friendship culminated with their colorful, energetic music video for “Boy With Luv,” but really it was celebrated with the diamond friendship bracelets Halsey bestowed upon her favorite K-Pop mega-group.

The collaboration and friendship between US popstar Halsey and the hit South Korean boy band began a few years ago. When a member of the ultra-devoted BTS Army tweeted Halsey in August 2018, “Your friendship between them is pure and genuine,” she responded, “We have been friends for almost 2 years! I am so lucky to know them and they inspire me so much. your boys are A+."

This means BTS and Halsey are celebrating their friendaversary (perhaps they’ll commemorate with diamond rings next time just like Ariana Grande's "7 Rings" squad).

BTS and Halsey met for the first time at the 2017 Billboard Music Awards so their 2019 performance makes perfect sense.

Halsey went on to watch her famous friends perform in South Korea. During a tour stop in Seoul, she hung out with BTS and captioned the photo, "I'm HELLA proud," complete with heart emojis.

She also called them an “inspiration” both on Twitter and in an interview with Heat: “They were so inspirational to me when I was making 'Hopeless Fountain Kingdom' because I’ve been up on BTS for a really long time. I was watching some of their earlier concept videos and I saw some of the philosophical references they were using and the colors and the warmness, and just all of it, it inspired me so much.”

She also teased their current collaboration, saying “I think we both have this conceptual thing that we really like to do so it could be cool to find some kind of bridge that is really good for my MO.”

Halsey even visited Korea a few more times to hang out with them. She went to Korea when they were first collaborating and returned when they filmed their instantly iconic music video together - it already has more than 240 million views on YouTube and was the most viewed YouTube music video in 24 hours, which is quite the accomplishment.

BTS told Halsey that she didn’t have to do the complicated choreography for their music video, so she proceeded to master the moves. Now, you won’t just be hypnotized by their high-energy choreo, their diamonds will distract you.

Most recently, BTS member J-Hope proved that he's a Halsey stan when he sang a verse from her new single, "Nightmare." Maybe they'll duet on that in the future.

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