“Spider” by Hoshi

Hoshi’s “Spider” is a love song, albeit a relatively-complex one. The singer likens his relationship with the addressee, his romantic interest, to being “tangled up” “like a spider”. 

That is the notion upon which the title is based. And the logical implication behind such an analogy is that he feels “trapped”, which is not a good thing.  In fact the intro features the vocalist crying out for “someone” to “help” him out of this situation. And in the first verse, he proceeds to enlighten the listener to the fact that he relatedly feels as if he is “in danger” and “can’t run away”. 

So one would be led to believe that he is worried about becoming entangled with someone whom he perceives as being a toxic partner.

But apparently, the matter at hand is not that cut-and-dried. Instead how the lyrics read, at least as far as the English translation of “Spider” goes, is as if Hoshi may be put off by the entire prospect of falling in love in general. 

That is to say that there is nothing detailed therein which illustrates that this lover he is singing about is a bad person. Yes, he does indicate that he is “intoxicated by (her) poison”. But all lyrics considered, that metaphor comes off, once again, as if he isn’t too keen on giving his heart to another. 

In fact earlier in the same verse, Hoshi puts forth that he ‘gets caught too many times’ as far as romance is concerned. And again, that doesn’t sound like any kind of personal misgiving towards his current romantic interest.

Pre-Chorus and Chorus

In fact the pre-chorus goes on to insinuate that despite his resistance to Cupid’s arrows, he is being drawn “closer” to this lady nonetheless. 

And in terms of the effect she has on him, as illustrated in the chorus, it isn’t one which would be deemed as negative in the general sense of the word. Rather, let’s say that the reason the vocalist is so alarmed is because this particular person totally mesmerizes him.  So it’s almost like, as far as he’s concerned, he’s too much in love with her and as such is apprehensive in terms of going any further.

All in all

So in reality, what we’re dealing with here is sort of a taboo-to-love type of scenario. Hoshi may “pretend to hate” this relationship, but in reality he “still like(s) it”. However, concerning the former sentiment for whatever reason, perhaps in the name of staving off potential heartbreak or losing too much of his personal willpower, he does not want to fully submit to the true feelings in his heart.

Hoshi

Hoshi is a musician who has established a name for himself as part of a relatively-large K-pop group known as Seventeen. He serves as the leader of the performance unit of this 13-man act, i.e. being the crew’s main dancer. 

Moreover he is part of a subgroup of the overall band known as Seventeen BSS, along with mates Seungkwan and DK. And “Spider” is the title track from what is his first solo project, a mixtape actually.

Writing of “Spider”

Hoshi composed this song alongside another K-pop musician, Bumzu, as well his Seventeen bandmate, Woozi. In fact “Hoshi” recruited Woozi for the track, who he described as a “friend” who has supported him for “the past 10 years’. 

And they came up with the name “Spider” after Hoshi played a demo for him, where “there’s a part where it sounds like a water drop is falling from a spider web”.

Release of “Spider”

Hoshi began teasing this song and the overall “Spider” project on 26 March 2021. And the track was released shortly thereafter, by Pledis Entertainment, on 2 April.

Interesting Facts about “Spider”

As of the release of this track Hoshi, who was born on 15 June 1996, is 24 years old.

It should be noted that whereas we referred to the singer’s romantic interest in this song as a she, apparently the lyrics do not actually contain any gender pronouns. 

Indeed it has long been speculated by fans of Seventeen that the Hoshi may be gay or bisexual. In fact he went on to sort of verify something like this himself in a tweet he posted in 2019.