Djo has been the musical alter ego of actor Joe Keery for more than three years, an actor you probably know for his role as Steve Harrington in the series Stranger Things.

Joe himself has mentioned that the balance of his two passions is important to him, and that unlike his acting work where many of us got to know him, his music is something he really enjoys doing without pressure, where he is in complete control of the creative aspect and being able to do what he wants and how he wants. Before he found life-altering fame playing Steve Harrington, the reformed bad boy of, he played guitar in the Chicago psych-rock band Post Animal.

In 2019 he released his first full-length solo project 'Twenty Twenty', an album that was written, produced and mixed by the same actor in his native Chicago, where he amazes us with 12 songs with a psychedelic indie pop sound, with references to Boy Pablo, Tame Impala or Mac deMarco. Recently, in September 2022, he published his second album "Decide".

Runner is the first song that opens this album, and a good reflection of what we are going to find, synth-wave synthesizers, Kavinsky-style vocoder and a powerful display of electronic music and tempo changes in the second half of the song.

Listen to my remake below!

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SYNTHS

I've needed about 13 synth tracks to recreate this song, let's get to it! Remember that you can download all these sound presets on my Patreon page.

The song starts with an 8-bit sound arpeggiator that I have recreated with the TAL-U-NO VST with the following configuration. Also important is the reverb that appears at the beginning and gradually fades away until the sound becomes clear. Listen below! Do you hear that gradual change?

TAL-U-NO Arp

A little later a bass-synth appears, which I have recreated with the Arturia Mini V with the following parameters. I have fattened the sound with the CLA-76 compressor and the Waves MaxxBass bass enhancer. Listen to this sound below.

Mini V Arp Bass Synth 1

To these two layers, a third is added later with a sharp sound adding texture. To recreate the sound I used the TAL-U-NO again.

TAL-U-NO Keys

Later, when the drums enter, another bass-synth appears, this time much more aggressive. I have recreated it with two layers of Jup-8 V from Arturia with the following configuration. Listen to it below.

Jup-8 V Bass Synth 1

In the bridge, one kind of propeller sound can be heard in the background, which I have recreated with a UFO preset in the TAL-U-NO.

TAL-U-NO FX Sound

At the end of the bridge, there is a soft pad where the drums disappear, recreated with the CZ V and the following preset. This sound will also be found at the end of the song.

CZ Pad

Finally, the second verse uses the same sounds of the first verse, with the addition of a key sound that makes a melody and that I have recreated with the DX7. Listen to this melody below.

DX7 Lead Keys

Do you appreciate this sound within the whole mix?

DX7 Lead Keys All Mix

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DJO VOCALS PRODUCTION

In this song I have tried a mix for the voices a little different than the rest of the songs, placing the voice in the foreground in a clear and bright way. For this I have used the same chain of effects that I always use and that you can find in the previous articles on my website.

But the magic this time has been to add the next Waves SuperTap preset which makes the voice spread out in stereo much more.

Hear the difference between adding this effect and not adding it.

Vocals without SuperTap

Vocals with SuperTap

In the bridge, the voice is passed through a Vocoder, which gives that electronic or robotic sound to the voice. To recreate this effect, I have used the VocalSynth 2 plugin for the first time with the following configuration, which you can find on my Patreon.

Vocoder

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DJO GUITAR SOUND

In the bridge some guitars appear. First there is one playing a series of chords that I have recreated with Guitar Rig 5 and some reverb.

Guitar Sound

On the other hand, there is a guitar strum playing at the same time and that I have recorded with a microphone directly and slightly equalized. Listen to this guitar together with the previous one.

Both Guitars

Finally a brief appearance of a wah wah pluck at the end of the bridge.

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DJO DRUMS

Finally, I have recreated the drums with a drum kit with snare, kick, hihat and tom samples separately. You can download these drum sounds within the SAMPLE PACKS that I share on Patreon!

All the drums are passed through the Goodhertz Vulf Compressor.

Drums sound

The snare has a bit of reverb with the Valhalla reverb, and a filter on high frequencies on the bridge part, can you appreciate it in the following audio?

Snare sound Verse-Bridge

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This has been all for now! It has been an accurate remake very similar to the sound of the original song, I hope you liked it!

Remember that you can download all the synthesizer presets that I describe in this article (there are quite a few!) and all the exported tracks on my Patreon.

Thank you very much for reading and supporting me, don't forget to subscribe to my youtube channel and tell me what you think of the video, see you in the next one!

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