Joe Keery is ‘thankful’ to see his song ‘End of Beginning’ going viral

Joe Keery is grateful as his music from pre-Stranger Things time is getting recognisation.

Before the actor and musician, 31, became a household name for his role as Steve Harrington in the Netflix show, he was a local celebrity in the Chicago music scene.

And, his song, End of Beginning, from his solo music project Djo seemingly went viral and it made it to the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. He originally put the song out over a year-and-a-half ago on his 2022 album DECIDE.

“It’s pretty crazy to see the reaction to the song,” Keery told People Magazine. “I have not totally moved on, but I’ve put it out and am at peace with it, so to see it now take new life has kind of made me reflect again on that time.”

Keery was a member of the psych-rock group, Post Animal, and has good relations with indie legends like twin Peaks and Whitney.

With the song coming back on the scene, Keery said that he is brought back to memories of “the camaraderie of all the bands back then.”

“Everybody was giving each other a leg up,” he reminisced. “Obviously, you wanted to perform well and write something interesting, but it was also a real sense of getting into it and doing something for the love of being creative.”

He added that the song going viral felt “validating” for him as an artist, considering Djo a side, passion project, adding that he is telling himself to be “thankful every day.”

“It's just mostly cool that I wrote about something that felt really specific to me in my life and turns out that a lot of people can connect with that same feeling,” Keery shared.

“I've had a really cool experience with Stranger Things, obviously, but I wasn't the writer of that. So this is my first foray into writing something and having it connect with people.”