It’s probably a pretty rare occurrence that New York City residents turn to D.C. for help, advice, or anything else when it comes to cutting-edge culture. But lo and behold, I just got word that Silver Spring’s Cuneiform Records has been asked by John Zorn to curate two weeks of concerts at that nonprofit haven for experimental music in NYC, The Stone.

The really shocking part is this: Cuneiform’s stint as curator will be from November 15-30, 2011. That’s right… Zorn and The Stone are planning two and a half years in advance. Hopefully the ridiculously long lead time will let some of Cuneiform’s overseas artists secure funding for travel so they can make a stateside appearance.

Congrats to Cuneiform for scoring what seems to be a pretty prestigious gig.

A new batch of good shit from Cuneiform Records only comes three times a year, so each time is worth noting. May will see Cuneiform put out:

• Led Bib – Sensible Shoes
• Miriodor – Avant!
• The Ed Palermo Big Band – Eddy Loves Frank
• Positive Catastrophe – Garabatos Volume One
• Upsilon Acrux – Radian Futura

Let’s see. This is all potentially good stuff. Perhaps most exciting (for me) is the Upsilon Acrux – this is a young avant-rock band who were once upon a time on D.C.’s own Planaria Records, whose last record Galapagos Momentum was a feast of heavy odd-time riffing. Miriodor are a Quebecois band who have a humorous and peculiarly Francophone take on avant-rock (you know it when you hear it); Ed Palermo has carved out a niche for himself reinterpreting Frank Zappa tunes, and by the name of this new album it doesn’t seem like anything has changed.

Then there’s the jazz. I know nothing about Led Bib, but apparently the Times (UK) said of them, “Sun Ra didn’t die in vain,” so that bodes well. Positive Catastrophe is a new group fronted by the always excellent Taylor Ho Bynum (and includes a favorite saxophonist of mine, Michaël Attias) and sounds really, really, interesting, purporting to combine Latin jazz and free/avant-jazz in a way that, as far as I know, hasn’t really been done before. Cool!

Cosmologic are a four-piece jazz combo and a recent signing to Silver Spring’s Cuneiform Records. They fit in well with the rest of Cuneiform’s jazz output: stuff that is very recognizably coming from within the jazz tradition, but pushes boundaries in any number of subtle ways. Not really free jazz and certainly not unrestrained collective improv, but honest-to-goodness grooving tunes with noticeable tendencies towards experimentation. (The Vandermark 5 might be a good, if more aggressive, example of a band that straddle that line in a somewhat similar way.)

The sax-trombone-bass-drums group released Eyes In the Back of My Head on Cuneiform last May and are making an appearance at Pyramid Atlantic in Silver Spring (home to many a Sonic Circuits event) tomorrow evening at 8pm sharp.

photo courtesy Cosmologic’s Myspace page