UXA.GOV

This text was composed and revised in fits and starts from 2010 to 2024, often in wildly different states, rooms, moods, modes, spirits, and epochs. It began as a response to John Zorn’s “ Treatment for a Film in Fifteen Scenes ” (composed in the 1980s ; published in Arcana: Musicians on Music. Zorn, J. (ed) , Granary Books, 2000, alongside work by Ikue Mori, Bill Frisell, Eyvind Kang, Marc Ribot, Mike Patton, etc. ), a 7-page outline consisting of 254 ‘shots’ (or prompts) described by brief (1-12 word) lines of all caps text. As a novel, UXA. GOV is meant to be read as a film; perhaps the kind one might otherwise only be allowed to view through slits in a training helmet deep before being work-released into what remains of the land where America once was. -- Blake Butler