Take Joe Keery for more than just his role as Steve Harrington on “Stranger Things” to appreciate the artistry he has grown into under his alias Djo.
He pulled all the stops and embellishments with songwriter-producer partner Adam Thein for this guitar-forward third album. Their complete access to the legendary Electric Lady Studios in NYC led to an indulgence in instruments, evident throughout this project.
Djo takes listeners through themes of existential anxieties, rosy retrospection, courage, rebirth, redemption, and love. The Crux is richly layered with tension, unpredictability, and electrifying releases.
With my deficient exposure to ’60s and ‘70s pop, Djo is a “Link” to many greats who inspired this album such as The Beatles, Thin Lizzy, Nick Drake, and Fleetwood Mac.
His album wouldn’t be complete with the synth elements and vocoderized vocals inspired by Tame Impala and Daft Punk.
The opener “Loneliness Is A State of Mind” begins with a mellow tone that gradually builds, picking up noticeably at 1:28. Throughout the track, Djo sprinkles in playful sound effects—like a truck starting at 0:55 and train noises at 2:13—that enhance its cinematic feel and full you along for the solo ride. Lyrically, Djo captures the disorientation of a breakup, realizing the future he once imagined no longer fits—and at 29, he’s learning how to embrace life on his own. The whispered ad-libs in the second half are revelations of the difficulty with this transition, softly dropped into your ears. By 3:20, the key subtly shifts, the drums become more defined and the guitars and synths bloom into a colorful display. These progressions mirror his emotional journey—moving past the dependency of romantic love and settling into the freedom of self-discovery.
“Basic Being Basic” is a gripping second song. The retro, springy synths and layered production create a vibrant, ever-evolving soundscape—it feels like every 10 seconds or so, something new is subtly introduced, keeping your ears engaged. His sisters lend their voices to the background vocals, adding warmth and dimension.
Midway through, the song breaks into a spoken-word moment that lays his feelings bare:
“It’s not funny, but it’s so funny / I don’t want your money / I don’t care for fame / I don’t wanna live in life where that’s my big exchange…”
Delivered in a deadpan tone, these lines call out the emptiness of superficial relationships and the lifestyle that comes with them. There’s ad-libbed laughter right after the word “funny,” but it’s laced with irony—it’s not a joke, even if it sounds like one.
Details like the metallic clank of what sounds like a jam block or cowbell, and the camera click right after “take a picture of your plate,” give the track a playful, tongue-in-cheek edge. And when he finally ends the track with, “I’m not funny,” it lands with dead-serious conviction. That contrast between levity and sincerity is exactly what makes this track hit.
“Link”, the third feels like the rising action in a coming-of-age film—when the main character is on the verge of breaking free from constraints. It’s the fastest-paced track on The Crux, and the energy is palpable from the start. There’s a tension at play here—a tug-of-war between liberation and guilt, celebration and confusion. He’s “graduated” and “emancipated,” but the freedom comes with a weight of decision. That duality—the crux—is the core of the song.
The verses bounce back and forth, mirroring an internal debate. Djo flexes his vocal versatility here, shifting from whispers to impassioned cries, layering emotions that are as conflicted as they are cathartic. Around the two-minute mark, an electric guitar rips through the track, growing more distorted and chaotic as it progresses—channeling the feeling of unraveling while also releasing.
The chorus slaps with a rock-heavy punch, calling to mind Thin Lizzy, with echoing effects that make it feel like a chant echoing across an empty street:
“Punch in punch out / Bad food still swallow / Same ripped old jeans / Blind leader I’d follow…”
He’s sketching out the bleak monotony of a routine existence, calling out societal complacency, poor leadership, and the numbness we’re trained to accept. His rhetorical questions—“What does it say about me, what does it say about us?”—are left unanswered, but they linger.
The police sirens woven into the track signal rebellion. By the final minute, the lyrics take a backseat to a full-on guitar jam that says: enough talking—just rock out. Just act.
Maybe I meme life too much, but this song could very well be paired with the particular meme of an unidentified man breaking free from chains above his head with a beautiful sunset in the back.
Next “Potion” opens with a sweet and delicate acoustic strum and soft falsetto. It’s tender, quiet, and intimate—Djo sings like he’s restless at 2 AM, love-drunk on a fantasy that’s just out of reach for the time being. The production remains mostly stripped down—guitar, tambourine, the occasional breathy sigh—until strings like cello and violin gently emerge, weaving warmth into the melancholy.
He becomes a hopeful romantic on a mission to find a connection that fills the void. The phrase “I’ll try for all of my life / just to find someone someone who leaves on the light for me” hangs heavy—it’s part literal, part metaphor. A desire for safety, consistency, and a person who will fill his depleted cup. There’s a spiritual yearning here, especially with the mention of the “witching hour”—as if he’s manifesting love, casting an emotional spell for a deeper kind of bond.
He connects the thread of distaste for surface-level distractions from Basic Being Basic with this song’s line “glitz and glamour doesn’t age like wine does”.
The song closes on a whimsical note—an instrumental break that dissolves into the soft flicker of a twinkle light turning off. It feels like a lullaby to himself, a gentle way of saying, rest easy, love will come.
“Delete Ya” kicks off with a snappy guitar riff, quickly blending spoken word with light melodic vocals—it’s seemingly casual at first, but that nonchalance is a mask. Beneath it lies a deep emotional unraveling. The smallest trigger—virtually anything—can send him spiraling into memories of a past relationship he’s desperately trying to shake.
There’s a specific nod to New York, with references to Blue and Gold bar and the “Stranger Things” cast—hinting at the grounding power of community when personal heartbreak threatens to uproot you. Even surrounded by others, he’s haunted by what he lost. Regret simmers quietly as he admits feeling both incomplete and partly responsible for the fallout.
As the song builds, so does the pain. The emotional layers deepen with airy, wind-like chimes and a high-pitched, glimmering synth that gradually picks up speed. Intermittent machine-like whirs evoke the noise of overthinking, spiraling, or even rewiring—like he’s trying to recalibrate after the breakup.
At one point, he catches himself wanting to rewind time—to go back to the moment he first met his ex. But just as that thought creeps in, the instrumentation halts sharply, like a firm slap to the face. It’s a jarring reminder: he knows better. Going back is futile. Forward is the only option.
“Egg” is a musical breakdown and breakthrough. It captures the shattering emotional breakup aftermath coupled with pushing 30. Specifically, the ways it can unearth your deepest insecurities and leave you feeling like a child again—raw and fear of the unknown.
With another mellow beginning, there’s a theatrical quality that develops—as the track pulses with dynamic shifts, acutely harrowing, and dramatic instrumentation. The crescendo builds with a sense of mounting dread, mirroring the way fear and self-doubt can suddenly overwhelm. Then, as quickly as it builds with screams cutting through the mix—everything drops out. Djo’s voice emerges in a near-dreamlike state, softly singing “Don’t you wish you could be somebody else?” before he sings with conviction:
“I’m cold cause I’m weak / And deep down inside /There’s nothing unique /But man is mold / And nothing is new / So why not release / And let it come through /‘Cause I’m fighting the flame /I’m gasping for air”
This moment of clarity feels like an ego death. The intensifying swirling instrumentation that once surrounded him is stripped away, leaving only his voice front and center. There are tightly wound instrumental buildups throughout—brief ballooning of sound that mimics the tension of a panic rising just beneath the surface. —and it propels the song into a second, beautiful synth-heavy, worked-up jam session that feels like a release. Then the song ends abruptly, like he just fiercely emerged from an egg.
“Fly” is the longest track on The Crux, and it makes full use of its runtime to explore the ache of letting go. It opens with a tender, minimal guitar line—so bare and fragile it feels like you’re sitting in a quiet house, hearing the winter wind howl against the walls. That atmosphere isn’t imagined: it directly ties back to Djo’s time in Calgary, where he spent a winter writing, reflecting, and untangling heartbreak.
The vocals shift subtly throughout—first in a clean studio tone, then into a lo-fi cassette-like filter, as if switching between memory and reality. It mirrors the back-and-forth of emotional processing, where moments blur and clarity is fleeting.
—“But I must fly, / Fly away from her”—ascends in pitch, literally lifting the listener with him.
Musically, it calls on the reflective soul of indie rock, the dreamy psychedelia of InnerSpeaker-era Tame Impala, and the soaring sentimentality of Fleetwood Mac. It’s tender, yes, but still reaches majestic peaks. Chime-like notes cascade throughout, and in the final stretch, layered wind sounds surround the listener—making it feel like Djo is truly suspended in the air.
“Charlie’s Garden” returns to brightness on The Crux, kicking things off with an upbeat tempo that subtly accelerates as the song progresses. There’s a buoyant energy here—playful and almost whimsical—with echoes of “Baby Blue” by Action Bronson and Chance the Rapper in the piano-led melody and tambourine flourishes. Djo leans into his falsetto, delivering lines with breezy charm while layering in rich vocal harmonies.
Midway through, the song hits a breakdown: a trumpet makes a surprise entrance and the key shifts, giving the track an unexpected and delightful lift. Toward the end, things get a little weird—in the best way—with burbling, robotic vocals that bring to mind Daft Punk and Thundercat. This textured outro gives the song a futuristic twist, without losing its nostalgic heart.
Named after actor and friend Charlie Heaton, who previously gets a mention in “Delete Ya”, “Charlie’s Garden” was written while Djo was filming—Heaton’s presence lingering in his orbit during the creative process.
Lyrically and sonically, the song reflects the comfort Djo found in Charlie’s actual garden—a place of calm and escape from the relentless pace of life and work. It’s a celebration of friendship, refuge, and the simple joy of finding peace in someone else’s world, even if only temporarily.
“Gap Tooth Smile” feels like an instant confidence anthem—an ode to embracing uniqueness that could easily spark a TikTok trend among girls with gaps and anyone with standout features. Djo playfully stretches his vocal delivery, channeling MJ-style over-enunciation and dramatic flair, especially when he flirtatiously sings lines like “Ooh La La that’s the spot.” The unexpected count-up to 29, which pauses and repeats that number, marks a symbolic turning point—on the cusp of 30 and stepping into a new chapter of singleness. That repetition creates a hypnotic effect, anchoring the moment in your memory.
At its core, the song celebrates the unforgettable features of his muse: a girl with a gap tooth smile. It’s sweet, unconventional, and wrapped up in a wash of electric guitar that stretches out and holds at the end.
In contrast, “Golden Line” is a beautiful, slow-burn ballad with intricate vocal layering. The track features layered vocals sung an octave apart, creating a rich texture that enhances the emotional weight of the song. It’s a poignant expression of love and devotion, with Djo repeating the phrase “I’d do it all for you”, reinforcing the lengths he’s willing to go to for his lover. His vocal climbing of notes is another highlight, especially when he sings, “I try to live up to”, as he grapples with the desire to meet this standard and make his love proud.
With “Back On You”, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus unexpectedly and serenely opens the track, ending their part with an impressively sustained note. Djo gives heartfelt credit to his sisters, crediting them as his lifeline and source of inspiration. The credit doesn’t stop there—three sisters contribute background vocals and one adds stomps, showcasing their impeccable teamwork. His gratitude reminds me of the idea that men with sisters are often seen as more emotionally attuned partners, a notion he embraces by citing himself as proof. With shoutouts to both his nuclear and chosen family, the track becomes a joyous tribute to collaboration, where the choir’s reappearance and his sisters’ contributions elevate the emotional richness and drive behind the song.
The final track, “Crux,” begins with a suspenseful buildup before transitioning into a lighthearted instrumental. Djo reflects on the realization that confidence comes from acting without overthinking, encouraging listeners to “get back to your heart” drives the point home to stay in tune with yourself when you’re at a crossroads
The Crux is such a fun nostalgic album that Djo clearly had loads of fun with and it is a great album for appreciators of music without a historied background in Djo’s 60s and 70s influences. It features a maximalist soundscape with a wide range of instruments, vocal techniques, and backup additions—there’s a lot to catch onto.
Djo reminds me that the human voice is capable of producing endless pitches, tones, articulations, and percussive sounds. It is very fun to sing along with these songs. Upon the first and second listens I already caught myself knowing the lyrics and instinctively singing choruses and bridges.
As offline as Djo is, End of Beginning will likely not be the last of his songs to experience a TikTok-induced virality. I predict that he will reach notable heights with “Link”, “Potion”, and “Gap Tooth Smile”, inspiring photo and video trends due to the lyrical relatability and fun vocal techniques that are a treat to sing.
I also appreciate his use of words I don’t use or hear daily, like epitaph, panache, and beguiled.
My only gripe is that I struggled to make out what he says at many moments so I relied heavily on written lyrics to wholly appreciate the themes and beauty of the album.
Since Djo doesn’t want to be an overarching mastermind and instead wants to let listeners take the reigns with their interpretation, I’m sure that social media platforms and blogs will continue to be flooded with hot takes, theories, and predictions analyzing every little nuance.
Djo will “Fly” through the rest of the Back on You Tour until -June 24, including appearances at the Coachella festival in mid-April and in Europe for shows throughout June. Post Animal, the Chicago-based indie-rock band of which Keery was once a member (2014-2019) and holds dearly, will serve as the opening act.
