Musician and actor
Joe Keery stakes his claim on the pop world with his third album as
Djo, 2025's swoon-worthy
The Crux. The album, which follows 2020's
Twenty Twenty and 2022's
Decide, once again finds
Keery indulging his pop passions while offering a fresh creative window on his persona as the loveable former high school jock-turned-righteous cool dude Steve Harrington on Stranger Things merely hints at. Just as
Keery's trademark mullet and devilish smile as Steve conjure a kind of '80 throwback charisma, his music as
Djo has an equally evocative quality. These are synthy, vintage '70s- and '80s-inspired pop anthems that vibrate with vinyl-era stardust. In fact,
Keery often so expertly captures the aesthetic vibe of the sound he's going for that his songs might fall into pastiche if they weren't so dang catchy and compelling. These are the kind of immediately infectious and mood-capturing anthems that stick with you, begging for multiple listens. In the past,
Keery drew upon the wry synth pop of artists like
Kraftwerk and
Thomas Dolby. And, certainly here, the tongue-in-cheek nerdiness of a song like "Basic Being Basic" sounds like a spiritual successor to the absurdist electro-satires that marked 2022's
Decide. However, the album quickly reveals a more organic and emotionally textured brand of album-oriented pop/rock. With its driving bass riff and throaty chorus, "The Link" believably conjures the nervy power pop spirit of
Dwight Twilley, while "Delete Ya" perfectly embodies the sugary, synth-sprinkled sound of
the Cars.
Keery has more on his mind than crafting stylish odes to his heroes, though, and there are real bittersweet emotions at the core of his songs that are as pure as pop can get. It's a wistful romanticism that reaches a crescendo on "Potion." Here
Keery frames his swooning falsetto with magical prog-folk guitar arpeggio as he coos for a lasting, mindful love, singing, "I'll try for all of my life/Just to find someone who leaves on the light for me." That the song also brings to mind an impossible collaboration between
Badfinger and
Queen's
Brian May, while also sounding singularly like
Keery, only underscores the deeply artful and emotionally engaging quality of his work. With
The Crux,
Keery doesn't just prove he more than owns his space in the pop world as
Djo, he's found a home. ~ Matt Collar
