Direct from Mel Cheren: West End Goes Digital

Adam@West End

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW YORK, NY - 11 June 2007 – After 47 years, West End Records co-founder, Mel Cheren, has announced his retirement from the music business and after more than 30 years, the legendary label will go completely digital. For fans and enthusiasts alike, West End’s illustrious catalogue will remain available at all popular music download destinations, including iTunes, Beat Port, Traxsource, and via its own web-site,westendrecords.com. Mel Cheren will continue his fight against HIV & AIDS through his work as founder of 24 Hours for Life, a not-for-profit organization of media and music professionals which produces fund raising events for AIDS relief and education. Mel would also like to wish Kevin Hedge and Josh Milan much success on starting their own label, Blaze Imprints.

West End Records was founded by Mel Cheren and Ed Kushins in 1976 and the label quickly became one of the defining sounds of New York City in the heyday of Disco. It was a sound closely associated with the Paradise Garage, one of the most influential clubs of the Seventies and Eighties. That sound has reached and continues to reach dance floors across the country and around the world. We are proud that West End – along with Prelude, SalSoul and Casablanca - is considered to be one of the most significant labels in Dance Music history. During the Disco era, many labels and artists scrambled to put out records that would ride the wave of Disco’s popularity, but West End didn’t build its reputation by jumping on many different bandwagons. Together with passionate professionals like Michael Brody and Larry Levan at the Paradise Garage, West End was able to create its own unique and lasting bandwagon. Releasing hits like Taana Gardner’s “Heartbeat,” Karen Young’s “Hot Shot,” Barbara Mason’s “Another Man,” Loose Joints’ “Is It All Over My Face?” and The New York Citi Peech Boys’ “Don’t Make Me Wait,” West End’s music has always come from the heart and has always been about creating a connection…a feeling of family on the dance floor. Today, its music still evokes that feeling around the world.

The West End Records catalogue contains some of the most sampled songs in music history. Samples of West End titles appear in productions of such million selling artists as Jennifer Lopez, Notorious B.I.G, Ja Rule, Ini Kamoze, DMX and many others. Even the current chart topper and radio hit, Buddy, from R&B artist Musiq Soul Child, samples the classic “Heartbeat” by Taana Gardner! Within the film industry, West End’s music can be found on the soundtracks of such films as PRÊT-Á-PORTER aka READY TO WEAR (Miramax, 1994,) LOVING JEZEBEL (Shooting Gallery, 1999,) HONEY (Universal Pictures, 2003), THE COOKOUT (Lions Gate Films, 2004), and the provocative and compelling documentary, GAY SEX IN THE 70S (Lovett Productions, 2006), to name only a few.

In other exciting news, the long awaited West End documentary, “The Godfather of Disco (G.O.D.)” is currently being screened at film festivals around the country to extremely positive reviews. Based on Mel Cheren’s powerful autobiography, “My Life and the Paradise Garage: Keep On Dancin,’” “The Godfather of Disco (G.O.D.)” offers a “mesmerizing overview of the rise and fall of ‘70s-era dance music,” according to Max Sparber of the Pulse of the Twin Cities (4/18/07). Through a series of interviews with a who’s who of the dance music community, G.O.D. uses the arc of Mel’s life to examine the early 70’s musical and cultural currents that gave birth to disco, West End Records’ contribution to that scene, the rise of Paradise Garage, and the onslaught of HIV/Aids and it's impact on New York City. We look at Mel's activist years as he harnesses the power of music to fight Aids via his charity work for GMHC and 24hrs for Life/LifeBEAT. Through it all, Mel has been there, done that, lived to tell the tale and continues to do it all today.

For more information about this documentary, view screenings news, and check out film clips, please visit: www.thegodfatherofdiscodoc.com. Stay tuned for the limited edition DVD package, coming to you at a later date!

NEW CONTACT INFO:

West End Records
318 West 22nd Street
New York, NY 10011
Office: 1 (212) 367-3737
Fax: 1 (212) 367-3738
info@westendrecords.com

For licensing inquiries, please contact:
Bug Music
C/o Garry Velletri
1 (212) 643-0925
garryv@bugmusic.com

WEST END RECORDS... WHERE THE SUN SETS AND THE STARS RISE!
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