6th Avenue Records

6th Avenue Records was launched in 1965 by Al Reusch as part of Aragon Enterprises Ltd., following the relocation of Aragon Recording Studios to its new home on West 6th Avenue in Vancouver, British Columbia. The label functioned as a companion to Aragon’s main imprint, documenting a wide range of Vancouver-area recordings through the late 1960s and early 1970s.

In June 1971, 6th Avenue was sold to Jack Herschorn’s Herschorn Productions Ltd., and shortly afterward was acquired by Can-Base Industries Ltd. Despite these changes in ownership, the label remains closely tied to the Aragon legacy and to the broader development of Vancouver’s recording scene during this era.

Notable releases include singles by Sy Risby, Chuck Flintroy and the Night Train, Montgomery, Alan Moberg, The Canucks Ltd., Oscar McLollie, Keray Regan, Patti MacDonnell, Joe Bradley, and Patty Lynn and the Pacers. Together, these recordings chart a uniquely Canadian musical geography and sense of place. From Oscar McLollie’s ode to the “Chilliwack Valley”, to Alan Moberg’s ballads of Gastown, the Cariboo, and the Williams Lake Stampede (with Patti MacDonnell providing backing vocals as well as releasing her own single), to Joe Bradley’s “Pacific Great Eastern Line”, a rail journey through B.C.’s interior, and The Canucks Ltd.’s “Yukon Song” from the far North. Adding to this mosaic is Patty Lynn and the Pacers’ “My Vancouver” (1968), a heartfelt pop tribute to the city with the line: “your north shore mountains rising high up above / with the skiers gazing down on the city I love.”

Among its most significant contributions, 6th Avenue also helped kickstart the career of Vancouver-born singer Iris Larratt, whose early recordings on the label marked the beginning of her rise as a notable Canadian voice.

Spanning northern soul, garage rock, folk, psychedelia, country, and pop, 6th Avenue Records served not just as a Vancouver imprint but as a chronicle of western Canadian life, preserving its stories, voices, and landscapes at a time when independent music in Canada was only beginning to find its footing.
-Robert Williston

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