“Do every stupid thing that makes you feel alive.” That’s how John Darnielle begins The Mountain Goats’ 14th studio album, Transcendental Youth. Taken together, the lyric and the title suggest the wild bent of the release. It takes up a frequent Mountain Goats theme, self-destructive youth, and focuses on characters Darnielle describes as “the sort of people you knew in high school that can’t seem to get it together… It looks as though they’re struggling, but at the same time they find a way.” In other words, if you liked “The Best Ever Death Metal Band in Denton” and want to go even deeper into the psyches of subjects like its heroes, Transcendental Youth is for you. Click through to stream the album, which comes out October 2nd via Merge and debuted at Rolling Stone.