“But I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now,” intones Bob Dylan on My Back Pages, inverting a perspective on age. But what does it mean to get older, or indeed, younger? “Adults are obsolete children,” said the perky, mischievous rhymer Dr Seuss. “A man growing old becomes a child again,” countered the beard-tugging Sophocles. “Forty is the old age of youth; 50 the youth of old age,” chipped in Victor Hugo. “Middle age is when you’re sitting at home on a Saturday night and the telephone rings and you hope it isn’t for you,” added Ogden Nash, in the rocking chair. “Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read,” said a sagely Francis Bacon. Can anyone do better than that? Reaching for the last word, Theodore Roosevelt remarked that “Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you’ve got to start young.” Oops. Indeed. Better get on with it then.

So then, ringing in the first full night of the new year, there’s veritable cavalcade of characters at the Readers Recommend pub tonight with remarks already flooding in. So welcome one, welcome all, for we start 2015 on a theme of songs about ages – from zero to as old as you can get, in numbers or other references to length of living. Who’s next? Now Mark Twain has jumped the queue, ordering himself a sneaky bourbon, with the line: “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”

But does it? Your song suggestions, RR friends, can mention any age, but what is it about certain numbers of years, and why do they matter? Are you as old as you feel, or any other innuendo-related version of this theory? Why is 16 special and is it really ever sweet? What’s so great about 21? Why have so many great performers died at the age of 27 (from Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse, Ron McKernan, Dave Alexander, to Alan ‘Blind Owl’ Wilson)? Is 40 unloved for “fairies” or others, and how is it at 64? Perhaps your song nominations can cover every decade, and name every number. Milestones of age have always seemed important, but why every 10? That’s probably because of the number of fingers and thumbs or toes we generally possess. If we had six digits on each hand, we would probably get wound up about being 12, 24, 36 and so on.

The passing of time and perception of age has been a rich source of inspiration in film and literature. James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ingeniously begins its narrative in baby language, gradually maturing in style as the protagonist, Stephen Daedalus, gets older. Richard Linklater’s strangely alluring and touching film, Boyhood (2014) was made over 12 years, and follows a six-year-old and his fictional family passing through the ups and downs of growing up to college years. Tokyo Story (1953) is a supremely moving and profound tale of an elderly couple visiting their busy son and daughter in the big city. Strangers in Good Company (1990) is a lesser known film featuring eight non-professional acting older ladies who take a bus trip to the Canadian countryside and, in docu-fiction style, improvise and banter about their lives and form unlikely friendships. Harold and Maude (1971) is a hilarious, oddball masterpiece, laced with Cat Stevens songs, about a wealthy young man who is obsessed with death falling into a relationship with a more than lively older lady – one of my favourite films in which the definition of age is brilliantly turned on its head.

But perhaps the most famous, non-fictional portrait of growing up, and capturing the passing of time, is the ongoing 7Up series, which was jointly created by Michael Apted in 1964, following 14 then seven-year-old British schoolchildren from differing backgrounds, variously revisited every seven years ever since, with the latest being 56Up in 2012. It remains a snapshot of life’s hopes, dreams, triumphs and disappointments. Like a stick of rock through TV history, the perennial reappearance of these familiar but non-famous faces has a comforting, sweet banality about it, but contains the essential DNA message and of what life does to us all. Such material, for better or worse, is also the building blocks of songs.

With an illuminating perspective on a span of ages, the Guinness Book of Records recorded this same recurring number – seven – as the most of generations from the same family to be alive at the same time. Great-great-great-great-grandparent Augusta Bunge (US) aged 109 years 97 days, followed by her daughter aged 89, her grand-daughter aged 70 and so on, right down to her great-great-great grand-daughter aged 15 on the birth of her great-great-great-great grandson on 21 January 1989. I recall seeing this or possibly another multi-generation family on the TV programme Record Breakers in the 1980s and it was almost impossible to tell the difference between the middle three or four women.

Is age then a linear process? Can it be reversed? In December 2013 Australian and US scientists claimed to have discovered a way to make a two-year-old mouse physically resemble one of six months old, by restoring the efficiency of cells and reversing the ageing process in muscles. Possible human trials were being discussed.

In a rather different and unusual case, and harking back to Sophocles’ comment, two British brothers, Michael and Matthew Clark were found to have a rare genetic disorder, leukodystrophy, that turned them from normal middle-aged men into adults with childlike behavioural regression. They were dubbed “real-life Benjamin Buttons” after the long, sentimental film about age reversal starring Brad Pitt. Tragically the brothers became unable to look after themselves and had to go back to their parents. Their interests began to turn to their childhood. One, for example, reportedly bought himself a train set and a Mr Potato Head, the other began to point excitedly at balloons.

For songs about ages, as a guideline, some previous topics have made a few overlaps – children, teenagers, and old age – but there is still an infinite of actual ages to pick out and these can span all generations. So then, nominate your age-related songs, and put them in comments below and optionally in the Spotify playlist by last orders (11pm GMT) on Monday 5 January 2015 for this week’s excellent returning guru, treefrogdemon, to pick out the finest from the forest of nominations – for results coming out on Thursday 8 January. Happy New year!

To increase the likelihood of your nomination being considered, please:

• Tell us why it’s a worthy contender.
• Quote lyrics if helpful, but for copyright reasons no more than a third of a song’s words.
• Provide a link to the song. We prefer Muzu or YouTube, but Spotify, SoundCloud or Grooveshark are fine.
• Listen to others people’s suggestions and add yours to a collaborative Spotify playlist.
• If you have a good theme for Readers recommend, or if you’d like to volunteer to compile a playlist, please email peter.kimpton@theguardian.com
• There’s a wealth of data on RR, including the songs that are “zedded”, at theMarconium. It also tells you the meaning of “zedded”, “donds” and otherstrange words used by RR regulars.
• Many RR regulars also congregate at the ‘Spill blog.