Djo

Djo is the musical alias of American musician and actor Joe Keery, best known for playing Steve Harrington on the Netflix horror-fantasy series Stranger Things. As Djo, Keery creates a quirky strain of psychedelic-leaning bedroom pop as heard on his 2019 debut album, Twenty Twenty, and Billboard-charting 2022 sophomore LP, Decide.

A native of Newburyport, Massachusetts, Keery studied theater at DePaul University in Chicago, eventually earning an acting degree. While in school, he and several friends formed the psych-pop band Post Animal and released their first EP, Post Animal Perform the Most Curious Water Activities, in 2015. That same year, he landed his breakout role as Steve Harrington on Stranger Things, which debuted the following summer on Netflix. Following the show's massive success, Keery continued to balance his acting career while still playing guitar for Post Animal, eventually leaving the band in 2019.

During filming breaks on the Stranger Things set, Keery began recording songs in a makeshift studio in his rented Atlanta house. Playing most of the instruments himself, he developed a melodic, psych-driven bedroom pop sound that eventually culminated in the full-length release Twenty Twenty, which he issued under the name Djo. A sophomore album, the '70s psych- and synth pop-inspired Decide, arrived in September 2022 and reached number nine on Billboard's Heatseekers chart. A companion two-song release, D-Sides, followed in 2023. ~ Timothy Monger