The songs that saved your life …

I must be getting old. Rather than continuing to be fascinated by new music, I'm starting seek out albums I loved in my adolescence.

Somehow, the music I listened to in my high school years has achieved a sort of nigh infallibility.

The Smiths. Morrissey. Pearl Jam. Squeeze. Nirvana. Nine Inch Nails.

Even Son Volt, though I didn't discover them until my second year in college. But "Trace" remains one of the last albums I loved in whole.

Whole albums. I liked whole albums, once. Not just 10 out of 14 songs on Cat Power's You Are Free, but whole albums.

Now, it'll be a verse from a song otherwise long-forgotten that gets stuck in my head and eventually leads to buying The Replacements' "Can't Hardly Wait" on iTunes just to scratch the itch.

I had friends over for dinner on Friday. One of them was recounting his recent iTunes Music Store purchases. I'd heard of one of the four or five bands he mentioned.

As the sheer amount of music available has ballooned, my skepticism about finding bands I'll love has also increased. I've quit my music magazine subscriptions.

Is there something about our tumultuous teenage years that triggers our brains to love the songs that saved our lives, then?

Now that I'm (fairly) settled in a routine and happy with my life, have I lost my capacity to swoon over soul-tugging lyrics?