Whenever Joe Keery is back in Chicago, we all feel it. On Friday, the “Stranger Things” alum brought his Djo music project home with a sold-out show at Chicago Theatre that felt like the sequel to his groundbreaking Lollapalooza set last summer.
Fans of all kinds were decked out in homemade shirts — “I (heart) Djo,” “It’s no use, Djo!” and “I (heart) the babysitter” among the top finds — while bartenders joked with starry-eyed devotees about how good-looking the actor/musician is.
Others in the seats were trying to figure out if the shadowy, mop-topped figure moonlighting as DJ b.i.g.s.h.r.i.m.p, who kicked things off with spins of Fergie and other 2000s ephemera, was Keery. It wasn’t. It was actually Jake Hirshland, Keery’s bandmate in Post Animal, who’s been opening on and off for Djo since 2019. Still others were pulsating with excitement and lining up for photo ops in faux sunflower fields, a take-home memento of the imagery plastered across the venue.
“As a young, interested musician I saw so many bands here that I loved and adored and aspired to be like. And to be able to travel across the country with my friends and play on some of these stages, meet these bands, see these bands and be enabled by the community that fostered it here, this really wouldn’t have been possible without any of that,” Djo told the crowd Friday night.
Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times
Ever since his ode to the city, “End of Beginning,” went viral, Chicagoans have laid claim to the musician, adding him to the list of worshipped local luminaries like Roger Ebert and Tom Skilling. To no one’s surprise, Keery performed his flagship song toward the end of the set, bidding the audience, “Let’s go!” as the ubiquitous verse set in, and the whole venue erupted in a singalong that felt like completing civic duty.
With no disrespect to Robert Johnson, “End of Beginning” feels like the new “Sweet Home Chicago” for this generation. You can only imagine how many have the lyrics tattooed. Even homegrown monoliths like United Airlines have capitalized on the popularity, synching the song for marketing campaigns. There’s no way the song hits as hard anywhere else Djo tours, so really, why shouldn’t we all bask in the moment? (Though he loses points for following it up with an encore of the melancholic “Chateau (Feel Alright),” a song about being homesick for Los Angeles.)
Keery got caught up in his feelings about Chicago too, remembering his fertile time in the city circa 2010-2017 when he studied theater at DePaul University and made his first bedroom pop songs in his North Side apartment. “This song was written right here in Chicago, Illinois, at my desk on Ashland and Addison,” he said to introduce the space-age electro pop of “Roddy.”
Later, he gave a heartfelt speech about the city’s music community that brought him up the ranks, first with the psych rock band Post Animal, before Hollywood came calling. A couple of the band members perform in his backing band today.
“I want to say one more thing before we close this thing out and that’s to say thank you so much to the Chicago music scene,” Keery said. “As a young, interested musician, I saw so many bands here that I loved and adored and aspired to be like. And to be able to travel across the country with my friends and play on some of these stages, meet these bands, see these bands and be enabled by the community that fostered it here, this really wouldn’t have been possible without any of that. I have great, great love and admiration in my heart for the people and for all the venues and people that work the venues. It was so formative for me, and I hope that I can help someone else too.”
Any budding talent watching the show had to be inspired. Keery and his harmonizing five-member band were a firing squad shooting off electro-pop-rock bullets, largely pulling from the latest album, 2025’s “The Crux.” From the gothic introduction of “Awake” to the Beatles-esque whimsy of “Charlie’s Garden” (about his “Stranger Things” costar Charlie Heaton) and the passionate synth ballad “Egg,” Djo’s material was a smorgasbord of musical styles woven into a complex tapestry that hinted he’s no one-trick pony.
Though Hollywood may have gotten to him first, there’s no question Keery would have held court on his own in the current pop echelon, even if we never knew of his famous screen character Steve Harrington. The set showed off another talent, as a skilled musician who moved from guitar to keys while delivering deeply-felt lyrics.
Much like the “Stranger Things” universe (which has also produced music stars in Maya Hawke and Finn Wolfhard), Keery’s musical alter ego is similarly stuck in the ’80s and a couple decades before, with his songbook a throwback to the eccentricity and musicality of ELO and Steely Dan on “Figure You Out,” the catchy handiwork of Hall and Oates on “Link” and even the folk spirit of Simon & Garfunkel on the plucky acoustic number “Potion.” The blinding strobe lights, thick fog and electrified sound that could’ve been charged by Nikola Tesla also felt like the arena rock of yore. It was a bit grandiose for the intimate Chicago Theatre but illuminated the potential for Djo to fill stadiums as he keeps ascending.
Friday night’s 80-minute show was a one-off, a warmup before Djo heads out on tour with Tame Impala in early July. Declaring it a “big show” with lots of family and friends in the audience, Keery seemed to be hinting that something may come of it in the future. Crews were recording the performance, and fans went home with complimentary art pop posters as they exited, only adding to the specialness of the night. As he’d be the first to say, you can take Keery out of the city, but not the city out of Keery.
Djo set list for June 26, 2026 show at Chicago Theatre
Awake
Change
Basic Being Basic
Link
Lonesome Is a State of Mind
Potion
Roddy
Fool
Figure You Out
Charlie’s Garden
Gap Tooth Smile
Delete Ya
Fly
Egg
End of Beginning
Encore
Chateau (Feel Alright)
Back on You