“I recorded over there and sometimes over here,” John Darnielle says, pointing at the hardwood floors in his humble abode, on the production locations for the newest Mountain Goats album “All Hail West Texas.”

The setting could have been anywhere. But a tiny house nestled under the canopy of trees provided a very familiar, comfortable dwelling for Darnielle to work on his craft. It wasn’t a desolate Texas town or a city touting a professional hockey franchise. (Not to say he wouldn’t have preferred it.) It was here in Ames – a location absent of diversions, allowing a musician of Darnielle’s stature to pull from the deep recesses of his mind the fictitious characters that dwell in foreign locations.

“The last album [‘The Coroner’s Gambit’] was about death and `Full Force Galesburg’ was about loneliness,” Darnielle says. “This one is about relationships – solitude versus being around people. Visions of people in Texas, out of the way.”

Many of the songs play out like the tortured identities in a Raymond Carver novel, especially “Faultlines.” “And we’re drunk all the time and our lives are a mess/And the deathless love we swore to protect with our bodies/Is stumbling across its bleak ending.”

“All Hail West Texas” isn’t emotionally heavy throughout. In fact, one has to smirk at the title of the album’s first track, “The Best Ever Death Metal Band In Denton,” and laugh thereafter upon hearing Darnielle strum about Jeff and Cyrus who never settled on a name, but narrowed it down to Satan’s Fingers, the Killers and the Hospital Bombers.

The characters are outcasts, snubbed by their peers, but victorious in the end. “When you punish a person for dreaming his dream/Don’t expect him to thank or forgive you.”

Darnielle himself is an outcast in a way. He continues to be an exemplary figure in productivity thanks in large part to his unorthodox lo-fi recording techniques by way of a boombox.

In a year’s time, he will have released “All Hail West Texas,” the latest addition to the Extra Glenns catalog, “Martial Arts Weekend,” and a new Mountain Goats album to be released on the record label 4AD.

With an abundance of material already out and more on the way, it is possible for Darnielle to rest on the laurels of his musical output and distance himself from the real world. Don’t expect it too soon.

Darnielle knows how to humble himself and intends to keep it that way.

For a while at least.

“I was at that point once, but you gotta stay working,” Darnielle says. “I write so people can hear and respond. I need to work for others to relate.”

It’s the daily routine that allows an artist to concentrate on the musical endeavors at hand.

“Doing normal work holds on to the daily routine and lets the unconscious run loose,” Darnielle admits. “I need a regimen; if not, there’s no time to write.”

In addition to oiling the gears that keep the daily ins and outs going, Darnielle keeps from becoming arrogant by listening to great music like that of Minnesota’s Lifter Puller.

“I’ll be listening to Lifter Puller and yell at my wife [Lalitree] `Honey, he’s a genius! I’ll never write a song as good as this!'”

But one can’t remain self-deprecating all of the time. At one point, an artist has to find the ability to fully realize what he or she does is thought provoking and in some way, exhilarating.

“To make your art is so special,” Darnielle says in a sarcastic, flamboyant fashion. Darnielle isn’t egotistical, but the Mountain Goats have to be to an extent to remain in existence.

“Recording on a boombox is a small endeavor and demands attention,” Darnielle says.

The next Mountain Goats release was done in upstate New York in Fredonia in a “real” studio. The result is a “big, lush orchestrated production,” Darnielle says.

Darnielle isn’t too worried about alienating lo-fi enthusiasts who rave over his album’s raw, unadulterated feel.

“It might, but people are always looking for an excuse to discredit somebody,” Darnielle says.

The future remains to be seen. Right now, Darnielle is focused on playing with long time friend John Vanderslice, whom Darnielle states is “so fucking great!” Darnielle praises Vanderslice for his ability to radiate light and warmth and is perplexed on “how a human being could not get along with him.”

Both Johns stop in at the Maintenance Shop Monday to illuminate patrons before setting off on a slew of dates at northern Iowa school lunch recesses.

“Local kids in Cherokee are big on the Mountain Goats,” Darnielle says humorously.

Only kidding.