Photo from Outpost’s myspace page.

When bringing up the rich history of D.C. music, certain names (Gaye, Ellington, MacKaye) and record labels (Dischord, Slumberland) immediately pop into mind. Factory Records is not one of those familiar names. Granted, Factory Records is based on the other side of the ocean and some of the names on that label (like Ike Yard) aren’t ones that necessarily ring a bell. However, Ike Yard’s Stuart Argabright hails from Arlington and the bands that were influenced by Ike Yard and other Factory Records no-wave pioneers reads like an all-star lineup of no-wave, experimental, and electronic heavyweights. Autechre, Black Dice, Aphex Twin, Liars — all have Factory Records bands like Ike Yard and Live Skull to thank for opening up the door.

Argabright and Mark C from Live Skull have combined forces and formed Outpost, which features all the sonic ambient brilliance you’d expect from a couple of No Wave heavyweights. They’ll be at the Velvet Lounge on Saturday night for the inaugural concert event from Rick Taylor’s established post-punk DJ night, We Fought the Big One. He’ll be joined by DCist approved local acts Blue Sausage Infant, The Plums and Screen Vinyl Image. We caught up with Argabright and Mark C to ask them a few questions.

How long had the three of you known each other before getting together to form these Outpost tracks?

Stuart: For my part, I had been aware of Live Skull once they started, met Mark and we did a session together downtown once in 1980. We then met again towards the end of the ’90s when he was doing electronic music with Unity Gain. In 2000, I asked him to contribute his track “Summer Snow” to Nowthenafter, a SurroundSound DVD collection of downtown musicmakers that Tellus would release this year! Then I ran into him on St. Mark’s Place last year and it seemed that both of us were into doing something new.