User:Dan arndt/Clarion Records

Clarion Records  was an independent Australian record label, which was founded in Perth in 1962 by Martin Clarke and Keith MacGowan. It was the first record label to be established in Western Australia and was instrumental in the success of local artists including Johnny Young and The Valentines, together with the development of the state's music industry.

History
Martin Clarke was born in 1940 and built his first recording studio in the family's home in Mosman Park as a teenager; he began his career working as a turntable-panel operator with Perth radio station, 6PR in the 1955, whilst continuing his studies at Scotch College. After a year with 6PR Clarke moved on to 6KY, where he worked in the office and by the time Clarke ended his internship he had already decided he wanted to build and run his own studio in Perth. At the age of 21 he set up a recording studio in North Fremantle, a few years later he sold that facility and purchased an old house at 272 Hay Street, East Perth, which he demolished and replaced, from the ground up, with Western Australia's first purpose-built recording studio, the Martin Clarke Recording Studio.

Clarke installed recording equipment, including a top-of-the-line Neumann lacquer-cutting lathe imported from Germany. The label's ability to produce its own master discs gave them total control of the final sound, as it ensured that sub-standard masters were not being used for pressing and avoided the risks of damage or loss of master tapes in transit and production.

Clarion had a subsidiary imprint Action, but few singles are known to have been released on that label. The first single issued on Clarion was "Jag Drag"/"Little White Star" by Peter Piccini and his Orchestra, which was released in 1962. The A-side was an instrumental and the B-side was a song with monologue, about the space flight of John Glenn aboard Friendship 7 on February 20, 1962, which made reference to Glen having seen the lights of Perth from orbit.

Clarion went into abeyance for several years until 1966, when it was revived, with Clarke acting as producer, engineer, A&R manager and (in the early days) distributor. Prior to reactivating Clarion, Clarke set up the shortlived Action label, but only three singles were released on this imprint.

Clarion released about 120 singles, along with 20 EPs and 20 LPs. Clarke also released about fifty singles on the Martin Clarke Recording Studios generic labels, and countless special one-off recordings.