As a teenager living in Bremerton, Washington, in the early Nineties, Death Cab for Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard would take an hour's ferry ride across Puget Sound to Seattle to catch shows at one of the only all-ages venues in town, the OK Hotel. Gibbard was a high school math and science whiz who says he was "brought up with strictly mainstream rock." The OK Hotel was where all that changed: a tiny, now-defunct club where artists such as Mudhoney and Built to Spill and Beat Happening and Nirvana played. Gibbard, who in addition to being a good student also swam competitively, was not the kind of kid to break curfew. The last boat of the night usually cast off at 11:30, and, often, Gibbard was able to catch only a few songs by the headliner before sprinting a quarter mile on the waterfront to the ferry terminal. "If he missed that last ferry, he was screwed," says his father, Alan.

"The OK Hotel could hold maybe 200 people," says Gibbard, "but to me, any bands that were playing there were already rock stars. I'd go see shows and be like, 'These guys are amazing, and you can talk to them after the show?' I remember thinking, 'Wow, it would be so great to someday do what [Built to Spill singer] Doug Martsch does.' "

Now approaching thirty, Gibbard and his bandmates -- bassist Nick Harmer, guitarist Chris Walla and drummer Jason McGerr -- have surpassed most of their heroes by a mile to become the reigning kings of twenty-first-century indie rock. Driven by organic yet synthy rhythms, layered with dreamy guitar and keyboard melodies, Death Cab's songs convey a sense of longing and detachment, like bittersweet love poems penned by guys who are too brainy and self-conscious to put their hearts on their sleeves. Gibbard's lyrics obsess over the details that speak volumes, like a peeling sunburn that marks the end of a summer romance.

In the course of five full-length albums, Death Cab for Cutie have amassed a hard-core following that only grew larger last year when they joined the historic Vote for Change Tour alongside fellow Seattlites Pearl Jam. Death Cab's major-label debut, Plans, arrived in late August with a sense of anticipation that surprises no one more than it does these former indie stalwarts.

"We never saw ourselves in a situation to have these kinds of ambitions or desires," says Gibbard, who also collaborated with beatmaker Jimmy Tamborello and Rilo Kiley vocalist Jenny Lewis for the Postal Service album Give Up -- now certified gold. All told, Death Cab for Cutie have sold more than 700,000 albums on the indie label Barsuk. And then, in late July, they released Plans' first single, "Soul Meets Body," online, and it was streamed 250,000 times in a few days. Before their new label, Atlantic, had released the song to radio stations, DJs were ripping copies and putting it on the air. "There was a time in this band's history when selling 100,000 records seemed like the most unattainable thing," says Harmer. "Only Fugazi or Pavement or super godhead independent bands sold 100,000 records. When our record crested over 100,000, it didn't feel that different. We were still living from tour to tour financially. But at the same time, there was such a sense of accomplishment. It was like, 'Is this the peak? Is it all downhill from here?' "

While scorching July heat fries the hordes of fans attending Lollapalooza at Grant Park in Chicago, Gibbard is relaxing in the air-conditioned lobby of the Hilton, across the street from the festival site. As he watches concertgoers milling around, the singer -- whose broad face and bowl haircut make him look closer to fifteen than twenty-nine -- sips an Amstel Light and sneers at some alterna-youth crossing South Michigan Avenue. "You know what got really annoying to me about the Ramones recently?" he asks. "Ramones T-shirts. I think people should have to take a test before they're allowed to buy one. Nothing complicated -- just, like, name me three Ramones songs."

Gibbard might come off like he's crabby (don't even get him started on the Carson Daly show, the British pronunciation of "ordinary" or Internet porn), but he sees himself as a realist. "Whenever there's a human-interest story in the news where somebody is struggling against adversity, it seems obvious to me that, like, no, little Timmy is not going to beat this and go on to play first base for the Mariners," he says, laughing. "He might get a lot of letters of encouragement at the hospital, but most likely the outcome will be less than desirable. I don't think I'm a pessimist for saying that, or for saying I know for a fact that this band is not going to last forever and I'm probably not going to be as successful doing music as I am now in twenty years. That's just reality, and I'd rather acknowledge it than dread it."

His father, a registered nurse who worked in hospital administration for the Navy during Ben's childhood, says that Ben has always been acutely sensitive. "As a very young child, he has always seemed to drink in the environment more than most," Alan says. "He could walk into a room and within three seconds observe that something had been moved. I think it's kind of a blessing and a curse."

The singer admits he has less to bitch about these days than he did a few years ago. Though Death Cab's previous album, Transatlanticism, documented in acute detail a series of "pointless relationships" with "weird and desperate and crazy" women, Gibbard's songwriting is nowadays informed by a relationship with his girlfriend of two years, Joan. But that doesn't mean Plans is all sunshine and puppy dogs. "Brothers on a Hotel Bed" begins with the line "You may tire of me," and "I Will Follow You Into the Dark" is about trailing a lover to purgatory.

"Denis Leary does this soliloquy," he says, "about how happiness comes in little doses. Happiness is like a cigarette or like beer or a cup of coffee in the morning. It's impossible to feel really happy all the time. Even being at peace with your surroundings still involves myriad emotions that kind of sway you in either direction. So I wanted to sit down and write a real, traditional love song, but it came out being a song about somebody dying. Because it's difficult for me to really enjoy something without only looking to the end of it."

Ever notice how nobody says 'pop a boner' anymore?" Gibbard asks from the passenger seat of the enormous white SUV carrying Death Cab for Cutie from San Diego to Los Angeles. "Or 'hump'? That's got to be the least romantic way of propositioning someone. 'Hey, wanna hump?' " Behind him, Walla toys with the overhead console, pushing all the buttons in rapid succession. "We have to get Chris behind the wheel," Harmer shouts from the back row. "His ADD is overstimulated."

"Yeah," Walla chirps. "Let Daddy drive."

Following a pit stop in Solana Beach for burritos, Walla gets in the driver's seat, McGerr dons his headphones, and Harmer -- who, after a few too many tequilas the previous night, revealed his idea for a photo book where guys pose with their dicks in hot-dog buns -- explains one side effect of spending nearly a decade on the road. "Touring has made us dumb," he says. "Used to be that if we saw some massive urban housing development, we'd wax philosophical about neo-Marxist sprawl. Now we just point and go, 'Dude! Fuck!' "

The members of Death Cab, all of whom reside in Seattle, met in the mid-Nineties, when Harmer and Gibbard were both attending Western Washington University. Walla, meanwhile, was studying recording at a community college. "I like to be in my own little world, tweaking things," he says over coffee in Chicago. An analog purist, Walla has produced all the Death Cab records and has worked on albums by Nada Surf, Hot Hot Heat and the Decemberists, among others. After Gibbard started dating one of Walla's best friends, the two got together and recorded some songs for a local label. They soon recruited Harmer and brought McGerr into the fold a couple of years ago after a series of drummer hirings and firings.

Though major labels had begun wooing the band as far back as 1998, Death Cab never gave the offers consideration until last year. Transatlanticism was fast becoming their best-selling disc ever, due in no small part to the success of the Postal Service as well as frequent mentions -- and a performance -- on The O.C. Gibbard acknowledges that signing to a major is a big move for Death Cab, and one they certainly didn't need to make. "I think people mistakenly consider us staunchly indie," he says. "But we want as many people to hear our music as possible. We signed to a major to try something new. And new things don't feel comfortable. They feel weird and sticky, but I feel good about it."

"There was a promise that bands made in the early Nineties," adds Harmer. "The promise was that music could be challenging and good and progressive and still be commercially viable. Somewhere along the line, it went off the tracks. I'm very happy that there seems to be some commodity in nerdy things again. That comic-book movies can be the biggest movies in the world and that there can be dork heroes like Napoleon Dynamite again. But, especially, that music doesn't have to be so homogenous and safe anymore. It makes you wonder not only is this the peak of our band, but also is it the peak of this time for all this stuff? Or is this just the beginning?"