SAN FRANCISCO — Bright Eyes' Conor Oberst insists his day-to-day reality isn't nearly as troubled as his tortured songs might suggest.

"I wish people would not worry so much about, like, the trivia of what parts parallel my real life," Oberst said backstage Friday night at the Great American Music Hall. "It's really not relevant to what we're trying to do, which is make music that stands on its own."

After taking the stage with his acoustic guitar, he introduced his band's wryly dramatic, lo-fi guitar pop by announcing, "Anyone in the balcony's welcome to jump right off."

Onstage, Oberst is a cynical young man with a huge stage presence and an intensity befitting his sometimes harsh lyrics ("I believe that lovers should be chained together/ Thrown into a fire with their songs and letters/ Left there to burn in their arrogance," he sings in "A Perfect Sonnet," from 1999's Every Day and Every Night EP).

Offstage, Oberst is your average (if uncommonly talented) 21-year-old, excited about going to Las Vegas over the weekend to "get tattoos and get really drunk."

The imagery and emotion expressed in Oberst's songs could be the musings of a world-weary man of middle age ("You were the saddest song/ In the shape of a woman," he croons on the new song "Laura"). The press has widely praised Oberst's insightful songwriting as wise beyond his years, though most tend to focus on the singer's troubled nature.

Oberst acknowledged that the dark themes he sometimes sings about do represent a part of him, but he made it clear that he's not consumed by angst, by any means. "The art you make isn't entirely you, it's not everything you're about," he said.

Still, though, Oberst seemed apprehensive at the thought of not having music as an outlet. "I don't know," he said, eyes wide. "I'd probably just fall over or something."

Bright Eyes consists of Oberst and a revolving lineup of his friends and fellow musicians, mostly from his hometown of Omaha, Nebraska. For Friday night's show, part of the Bay Area's annual Noise Pop music festival, his bandmates doubled as the backing band for tour mates Azure Ray, and they, in turn, contributed piano, trumpet, guitar and vocal duties for Bright Eyes.

Crowd favorites included "Haligh, Haligh, a Lie, Haligh," the frenetic "The Calendar Hung Itself" (both from last year's Fevers and Mirrors), the grand "Pull My Hair" (from 1998's Letting Off the Happiness) and a full-tilt cover of Neil Young's "Out on the Weekend."

Later this month, Sub Pop will release a Bright Eyes 7-inch — "I Will Be Grateful for This Day, I Will Be Grateful for Each Day to Come," backed by an alternate version of the Fevers and Mirrors track "When the Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass," called "When the Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass Again" — as part of the subscription-only Sub Pop Singles Club.

In January, Bright Eyes released Oh Holy Fools, a split EP with fellow Omaha rockers Son, Ambulance. Oberst says a rock side project is also in the works.