How Joe Keery’s Musical Alter Ego Djo Shocked the World with ‘End of Beginning’
By James H. Sterling
Before television fame found him, Keery was deeply entrenched in the Chicago underground music scene. He cut his teeth playing guitar and contributing vocals for the psych-rock outfit Post Animal. When filming commitments for the breakout Netflix flagship series pulled him away from regular touring, Keery refused to abandon songwriting. To avoid the familiar curse of the "actor moonlighting as a musician," he developed the disguise of Djo.
In his early solo performances, Keery wore oversized polyester suits, heavy sunglasses, and a bowl-cut wig. The look disarmed expectations and obscured his recognizable face, forcing crowds to judge the music purely on its sonic merits. His 2019 debut album, Twenty Twenty, leaned into fuzzy guitars and neo-psychedelic textures reminiscent of Tame Impala. By 2022, working alongside engineer and co-producer Adam Thein, Keery traded raw psych fuzz for glittering arpeggios, analog synthesizers, and punchy drum machines on Decide. Keery made no grand public declarations about the record, dropping it quietly through independent distributor AWAL without chasing radio playlists.
James Sterling reports on renewable energy developments, climate policy, ecological conservation, and green tech innovations around the globe.
