On July 15th, we’re getting Hobi’s new album Jack In The Box - and it promises to be both fascinating and darkly brilliant. This is a look at the astrology of JITB, and what it says about Hobi’s artistry as well as the themes we might see in this album.

Jack In The Box has a Cancer Sun, Aquarius Moon and Libra ascendant. That the Sun is in the 10th house – place of visibility, public actions and reputation – isn’t surprising. Many of BTS’ recent releases have happened at 1PM KT, which is coincidentally the part of the day when the sun is at its highest point in the sky. With a Libra rising chart, Venus is the ruler of the 1st house and of the chart itself. The planet of connection, creativity and pleasure is therefore the symbol and guardian of how this album is going to manifest in and interact with the world.

JITB being ruled by Venus in Gemini almost feels too on the nose. Gemini is a space of intellectual and social exchange, gathering and transmitting data, curiosity and playing with knowledge. Its ruler Mercury is a messenger god who moves between worlds, a being without fixed gender who is nearly impossible to pin down. Mercury is also a trickster god – patron of thieves, of those who evade the rules and disrupt in order to learn, or to show where change is needed. When we talk about Gemini placements, we’re describing planets that revel in being many things at once. About figures who bend definitions of truth and morality who offer the alternatives to structure that we need. The Fools in Shakespearean tragedies. I don’t need to point out how this fits with Hobi’s character Jack, the dark jester of JITB.

Venus in Gemini is a shapeshifter, a conversationalist, a seeker, a creative jack-of-all-trades. Someone who isn’t satisfied with just one mode of expression or a simple narrative. Someone driven by a desire to engage with a multitude of mediums and stories (sound like someone we know?). Venus in Gemini thrives on abundant intellectual and social stimulation – it plays with convention and finds pleasure in breadth of possibility. For JITB, Venus is in the 9th house of beliefs, guiding principles and structures of knowledge. It is also in the 3rd decan (last 10 degrees) of the sign, which astrologer Austin Coppock calls ‘The Executioner’s Blade.’ The decans of Gemini speak to a relationship to knowledge, starting in the first decan with an abundance of pathways to explore, before embracing duality and finally having to make a choice – what do we have to leave behind in order to move forward? What do we have to kill off?

In MORE, Hobi talks about “endless learning” and “doing it all” while “still not [being] enough” – a perfect representation of that space of infinite potential that starts in the first Gemini decan. From the Arson teasers (“burning it all”), the last song on the album shows a kind of explosive ending, whether chosen or not. Maybe he’s pushed himself to the brink of self-destruction and burnout (as suggested by the concept photos). Sometimes it is only by meeting our extremes that we can embrace change. Either way, Jack/j-hope/Hoseok has burst out of the box to chart a new route. Multiplicity provides the freedom needed to see the cracks in the structure, and to enact change.

Looking at the relationship between Venus in the 9th and Mercury in Cancer in the 10th house, I think JITB is an exploration of Hobi’s beliefs around the different facets of his work, his creative practice and his public image over time. Mercury in Cancer is an oral historian, a storyteller, a weaver of memories who understands how to honor the past and also how to grieve. It can hold and absorb what is beyond verbal expression but lives in the body. It’s perfect for an album that narrates his growth at a deep, visceral level. Mercury here is combust, i.e. so close to the Sun that it’s being burnt up. The symbolism reminds me little of the myth of Icarus and the idea of pursuing a goal so fervently that one is annihilated by it. Icarus’ story is a cautionary tale about foolishness and hubris – it’s also a story about the inherent humanness of being so consumed by desire we are willing to give everything up. Importantly, the Mercury in this chart is no young fool, but a tired planet returning to die and be reborn in the Sun’s flames after long travels. It is a Mercury on the precipice of necessary transformation.

With both the Sun and Mercury in Cancer, we also have to look to their ruler – the Moon in Aquarius in the 5th house. The 5th house is a space of beauty, joy, creativity and bringing things into the world. It’s where we find our passions, our hobbies, and what we enjoy doing in an embodied way. (As a note of interest, the Hope World chart has three personal planets – Sun, Mercury, Venus – there.) In JITB’s chart, we also find Saturn in its home sign, hosting the Moon.

The conversation between these planets is rooted in Saturn’s influence, which in Aquarius speaks to strategizing, analyzing and working with information around creative expression and passions. Hobi’s approach in this album will likely be thorough and methodical (as he is in general), as he evaluates his path and looks to the future. This is an investigation of what he truly wants from his relationship to his work and practices, particularly since the Moon adds an embodied layer around needs that can’t be ignored. Saturn in this chart being retrograde could indicate a time of retrospection, reflection and possibly untangling different narrative strands in order to move forward. Its placement in the last decan of Aquarius, which carries symbolism around facing a particularly tricky problem, aligns with the idea that we’ll see him contending with many feelings, ideas, realities and possibilities.

From what we’ve seen of Arson, there are suggestions that Jack breaks out of the box he’s confined in – and even burns the box itself. With Mars in Taurus in the 8th house, a place of grief and liminality, there does seem to be an act of severing from some of his past selves, if not all of them. What we don’t know is who he becomes, and what that means. The 5th and 8th houses hold the tension between desire/newness and grief/loss. In this chart, there is an added layer of complexity as we find Taurus – a place where we want to connect and experience through the body – in a space of surrender and release. On the other hand, the 5th house demands embodied action, but Aquarius and Saturn prefer to stay distant in order to make objective decisions.

We also find the North Node, symbol of increase and hunger, right next to Uranus in Taurus. Not only is Uranus commonly associated with literal explosions and radical change, the North Node in a house often associated with ‘taboo’ and sometimes difficult topics points to Hobi’s desire to really dive beneath the surface – and take us with him. This isn’t him couching his hunger in aesthetics – he’s finding unapologetic delight in baring his teeth and saying come, eat with me.

Here lies the paradox of these dynamics – that there is a symbiosis or unbreakable relationship between what has to die and what wants to grow. There is a kind of pain to hunger, as well as a kind of relief to be found in letting go. Mercury and the Moon’s role in this is to hold what we carry forward with us as memory. Saturn, squaring the nodes, structures the chaos enough to be released into the world as art. I could write much more about the ways the Aquarius and Taurus placements in JITB’s chart map onto those in Hobi’s own birth chart, but I will just say that his very prominent natal sun is in the last decan of Aquarius, and his Taurus moon is a very important planet that’s highlighted by the JITB Taurus placements I’ve discussed.

The paradoxical tension in this chart, and which I think will be explored in the album, is one that mirrors thinking around the nature of hope. In Hesiod’s myth, Pandora is crafted by the god Hephaestus and gifted to Prometheus’ brother as a punishment to mankind. She opens a box containing all the evils of the world and when they all fly out, only one thing remains: hope. There is debate over the nature of hope from classicists, with many differing arguments: is it another evil, or a trapped blessing? What’s interesting to me in relation to Hobi’s work and JITB is precisely this ambiguity around hope. The philosopher Spinoza writes about hope and fear as two sides of the same coin in relation to uncertainty. This makes me think of how quickly the two intertwine, and how horror (with all the references in the MORE MV) plays on both in equal measure. For hope to exist there has to be destabilization, destruction – and the potential for better.

Pandora seeks the edge of what she knows. She wants more, and is made monstrous by it. Feminist readings of the myth discuss the misogyny of a woman constructed as an object of desire, and who through her curiosity – or arguably her very nature – is condemned. But what if we embraced both desire and fear? What could be birthed from that place? This is the tension of JITB’s 5th and 8th houses, of wanting to create while changing constantly, while being afraid.

What I expect from Hobi in this album is a grappling with himself – different selves, ideas, feelings – as an archive of his growth. This is Hobi on the edge. We know it will be a departure from anything we’ve seen from him before, while staying rooted in his unique style and artistry. So what are the many faces and manifestations of Hope? Who are they inside and outside of the box? What acceptance does he reach and how is he following his desires going forward? These are my questions – what are yours?

JACK IN THE BOX BIRTH CHART ANALYSIS

SEVEN OF WANDS

CANCER SEASON