IT'S a real lottery, this CD reviewing lark. Generally speaking, what you gain on the swings you lose on the roundabouts - which is to say that for every enduringly wonderful piece of music that passes between your ears, there'll be several hundred Ibiza Foam Party 1988 retrospective box sets to contend with.

This week, however, I've gained not only on the swings but also on the roundabouts. I've slid down the slide without giving myself friction burns or causing my trousers to fall down, and I've had a go on the horse on a spring without being summarily jettisoned.

What I'm trying to say is that I've enjoyed, to an inordinate degree, everything I've listened to in the past week, starting in fine style with the long-awaited debut single from Weymouth's own Butterfly Bangs.

The single in question, On The Street/Rosemary Works (Weekender) is, frankly, a blinder, repaying in spades the faith that so many of us have had in the band since their inception.

As is customary with Butterfly Bangs, you will clutch in vain for reference points. They occupy a sound space which is emphatically their own - no mean feat in 2007. Suffice to say that On The Street bristles with genuine, fresh-out-of-the-traps excitement and instils in the listener the odd but pleasureable sensation that the track is somehow ascending.

Butterfly Bangs would never stoop to anything as crass as a predictable mile-high chorus, yet On The Street remains as catchy as burrs on a mohair jumper. A vibey production by Russ Keffert (The Rakes, Larrikin Love, Vincent Vincent & The Villains) keeps the VU needles bouncing in the red, and flipping the record over (it's a rather lovely 7" vinyl artefact) reveals the band's innate sense of quality control.

Rosemary Works is worthy of double A-side status as far as I'm concerned - decorously melodic and suspended on a deftly woven bed of acoustic guitars.

As you read this, Butterfly Bangs are on tour in Germany, Austria and Hungary, but are next playing in Weymouth on Sunday, May 27 in the Lazy Lizard. Encouragingly, their single will be available from Music Zone in town, but a brisk visit to www.myspace.com/butterflybangsuk will reveal any number of alternative sources. I'd love to see them in the charts, where they belong - they'd improve the neighbourhood no end.

Speaking of unclassifiable contemporary bands who simply haemorrhage quality, The Crimea are back on the case with an utterly beguiling new album, Secrets Of The Witching Hour (Free, Two, One).

It's just beautiful - invigoratingly strange, limitlessly imaginative and powerfully atmospheric. Vocals are ragged and ghostly, guitars are dizzyingly blurred and the sum of all the parts is an album which leaves an indelible impression and simply demands repeated listening.

Best of all, you don't even have to take my word for it. In a bold and laudatory move, The Crimea are making the album available online, absolutely free. A CD version will still be available in record shops for fans who would prefer a "physical format", but the band are encouraging everyone to follow the free download route - "a brave, innovative new business model that places the emphasis back squarely on artistic development and control."

The album is yours to download at www.thecrimea.net from May 12, and I can't urge you strongly enough to seek it out. You have nothing to lose and, trust me, a world of wonders to gain.

Elsewhere, it has been a pleasure to hook up once more with old and trusted friends in the shape of Fountains Of Wayne, whose new album Traffic And Weather (Virgin) is a typically upright repository of mordant wit and skyscraping tunes.

There is more poignant detail and penetrating insight in a single line taken at random from any FoW song than many bands manage in an entire career, but a lovingly ironic air-punching hookline is never far away either. Check out New Routine and This Better Be Good for consummate, shining pop savvy, and try Michael And Heather At The Baggage Claim and 1-95 for weightless balladry unparalleled in its understated grace.

Finally, you may remember me expressing mild surprise some weeks ago at how much pleasure I derived from the current Carla Bruni single, Those Dancing Days Are Gone. Who'd have thunk it - the parent album, No Promises (Dramatico), is every bit as impressive, a lusciously indulgent undertaking which sees Carla setting to music the poetry of, among others, Emily Dickinson, W H Auden and Walter De La Mare.

It shouldn't really work, but it does, tremendously well. Carla may be an ex-model but there's nothing precocious or mannered about her gentle delivery, and markedly intuitive musicianship keeps the whole venture well within the parameters of good taste.