"Being a 19-year-old giving a lot of interviews is really dangerous, because you don't know much at 19, and you think you know everything," Miller says. "You say things like, 'When I was younger...' Than what?'"

He laughs and begins walking to his car to get on his way to the airport to catch a flight home to Los Angeles, where he moved two years ago to be closer to his girlfriend. "I used to say, 'I feel like I'm damned to do this,' you know, like I don't have any choice, like even if I'm starving I would be doing this. And I don't feel like I have a choice. So I'd like to hurry up and make some dough so I can take some time off and write my book."

Miller laughs and walks to his car. Watching him drive off, it's hard not to think that even if Fight Songs doesn't do as well as he and his label hope, it won't deter Rhett Miller. The boy has grown up onstage, with a guitar in one hand and a half-finished mystery novel in the other. It's where he belongs.