These days, networks are practically spawned by selling sensitive indie soundtracks, what with Scrubs releasing a comp featuring Guided by Voices and the Shins performing on Gilmore Girls. One Northwest songwriter, David Terry, is becoming well versed in the musician friendly world of licensing material for the product-placement generation. "Hopefully my song will be in that cool milestone episode that everyone remembers. Like the big one on the DVD," he says, half-jokingly.

Terry, a recent Seattle-via-Oklahoma transplant and the mastermind behind one-man band Aqueduct, is talking about his premiere spot on The O.C. His track "Hardcore Days and Softcore Nights" aired on the Fox drama this past January. Speaking before its big debut, Terry said, "I think they're gearing up for this big lesbian episode. They're supposed to use [the song] three times in one show." But with songs by his old pop-punk group Epperley finding placement on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the American Pie 2 trailer, Terry's becoming an old pro at hitting the teen-dramedy-fixated demographic. "I just found out today that The Real World wants to license some stuff," he adds. "That's pretty cool."

It wasn't necessarily Terry's boyhood dream to boost viewership of the nation's premiere (un)reality programming through song. A musician since early adolescence, he simply creates records that the young, tuned-in demographic can relate to. On Aqueduct's new debut full-length, I Sold Gold (Barsuk), "Heart Design" places Terry's admissions of "I don't want you to think that/ my heart is untrue" over skittering drum-machine beats and chiming videogame blips, like a more outwardly hopeful Postal Service. But just when you fear Terry's reached too far into his LiveJournal, he hits back with "Hardcore Days and Softcore Nights," flippantly demanding, "Don't ever ask me where I'm from/ In six states that's considered dumb."

Gold, the follow-up to last year's Pistols at Dawn EP, crests with ebullient pop tunes that are simple in structure, unabashedly focused on girl-boy drama, and wry in lyrical delivery. You know, sort of like One Tree Hill.