Keegan Lawler | Issue 12, Fall 2026

CONTENT NOTE: This piece discusses substance abuse and self-harm. It explores themes of the supernatural, the occult, and how to overcome suffering.

From its opening moments, Transcendental Youth lays its heart bare to listeners: nobody here makes out well. They live, maybe, but their lives are not as much about living as avoiding suffering. Its characters overdose, carve their palms with their fingernails, sleep on sewer grates to avoid government surveillance. The instruments know this, too. Whether it’s the skip-hop guitar strumming in “Harlem Roulette” and “Cry for Judas,” the piano ballads of “White Cedar” and “In Memory of Satan,” or the swelling organ of “Night Light,” everything feels dampened. Even the drums feel like they were recorded in a room where someone hung blankets to keep out the light.

How do we move beyond avoiding suffering? The characters of Transcendental Youth conjure the supernatural, perhaps even the demonic. They cry for Judas Iscariot, invent spells, and worship Baphomet. In the title track, they take flight to escape into the night sky, setting fire to that which lay beneath them. For those of us who know how to hope beyond hope, the desperation baked into the beliefs we make up for ourselves, Transcendental Youth waits for you.