Though Mel Cheren's name may be preceded by “Godfather of Disco” more often than “gay pioneer,” it's hard to imagine queer culture moving towards mainstream acceptance without him. A formidable figure in New York City nightlife in the 1970s and ’80s, Cheren created the 12” dance single, financed club mecca Paradise Garage, and founded the influential disco label West End Records. He also gifted office space in the early ’80s to a new group established to combat what would soon become the AIDS epidemic: the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC), the first organization of its kind.

Sadly, Cheren died from pneumonia as a complication of AIDS in 2007, after decades of work that helped make dance music the worldwide force it is today. It's impossible to overstate the importance of his label, West End, not just in disco but in hip-hop and house as well, thanks to a roster that drew from soul, R&B, gospel, and funk. West End fueled the sound of both the Paradise Garage and Studio 54, and launched the careers of many pioneering remixers. Some of the headiest early work from Tom Moulton, largely credited with inventing the remix, was for the label. Other luminaries and legends abound under the West End name: Larry Levan, Tee Scott, Walter Gibbons, François Kevorkian, and Arthur Russell, with one of his earliest dance-music productions.

Last month, the label relaunched with “Anxious,” the first single in two years from DFA stalwarts Holy Ghost!. A sweet, slow crest of ’80s disco, “Anxious” serves as a lasting tribute to the “Godfather,” down to a remix from Moulton and a charity component benefiting GMHC and LIFEbeat, a music-centric nonprofit promoting safe sex. The release anticipates a wider relaunch of West End expected next year. In the meantime, here's a selection of the label's ageless, still-spry sides.

Sesso Matto ‎– “Sessomatto” (1976)

The first release on West End was a slice of Italian cheesecake. The instrumental came from the soundtrack for a 1973 Dino Risi comedy that translated as “How Funny Can Sex Be?”. For most of its 10-minute runtime, the song sounds slinky and breathy if a little boilerplate—save for a scratch effect at the break. When Cheren encountered Grandmaster Flash in the early ’80s, Flash told him that the song's reverse-tape scratch was one of the earliest breaks that DJs used for rappers in the Bronx.

Jakki – “You Are the Star” (1976)

With only two singles to their name, Jakki nevertheless served as the bridge between Philly-soul opulence and disco bliss. The exquisite female vocals and uplifting horn and string sections are propelled by incessant drums and cut with a wistful flute line that lends a bittersweet feel. “A Tom Moulton Mix” means that it's as masterful as any orchestra—the remixer as conductor, balancing it all so the song can both soar upwards and bear a trace of heartache.

Bettye LaVette – “Doin’ the Best That I Can” (1978)

Bettye LaVette is now rightly renowned as one of our greatest living soul singers, with a career that stretches back to the early ’60s. Like many singers of her time, LaVette attempted to keep up with changing musical tides by cutting a disco tune in the ’70s. Cheren tapped Walter Gibbons, one of the first DJs to apply Jamaican dub strategies to expand space and time in sets, to make a dizzying, opulent remix of the song. When Gibbons opens the filter wide on the phased bass nearly seven minutes in, it opens a portal to another dimension. Though Cheren thought the remix “sounded like a musical acid trip,” LaVette was “not pleased at all” with the results.

Loose Joints – “Is It All Over My Face?” (1980)

“With that vocal, I thought to myself: are they kidding?” said Cheren of the first time he heard Arthur Russell's tawdry West End single. The downtown composer had already been drifting between the experimental music scene at the Kitchen and the gay dance parties at David Mancuso's Loft and the Garage, his music ranging from minimalism to R&B-tinged disco. Delving into the pop vernacular, Russell could convey—as his biographer Tim Lawrence once put it—“hedonism, hope, and humor”: This shambolic, left-field number referenced everything from oral sex to Matthew 7:7.

Taana Gardner – “Heartbeat” (1981)

Kenton Nix was one of West End's secret weapons, from his proto-house debut “There's Never Been (No One Like You)” to his productions for others. He brought one of the label's biggest stars to Cheren by chance, meeting singer Taana Gardner at the airport while waiting to pick up his brother. Soon after, she jumped on the relentless groove of “Work That Body” and her career took off. Nix brought a new track to Cheren based on the seductive thump of a heartbeat—slow enough to immediately clear the dancefloor, but dreamy enough to eventually win listeners over. The telltale thump soundtracked New York City that summer, the song “pouring from every open window, every passing car, every jukebox, the world moving in rhythm,” later remembered by Cheren.

Sparque – “Music Turns Me On (Instrumental)” (1981)

Mixed to dancefloor perfection by Larry Levan and Francois K, Sparque's other 1981 West End single, “Let's Go Dancin’,” is a party-starter from the jump. That said, there's just something about this sinewy remix of their “Music Turns Me On,” from unsung remixer Tee Scott, that draws you in over time. Scott's very first remix–of First Choice's “Love Thang”—turned it into a voguing standard, and his subsequent work remains elegant and supple without feeling overcrowded. He rides the chicken-scratch guitar line here and adds a lithe bassline there, the mix slyly serpentining around its sleek contours.

Raw Silk – “Do It To the Music” (1982)

While disco was deemed dead by the late ’70s, the party continued unabated at the Paradise Garage. West End singles would regularly cross over from the club's dancefloor to Frankie Crocker's show on the influential New York station WBLS, yet the label always teetered between success and collapse financially. In 1982, they landed another two-hit wonder with Raw Silk, whose singer Sybil Thomas was the daughter of Memphis soul legend Rufus Thomas. “Do It to the Music” soon became a club hit, largely thanks to Levan playing it six times in one night and Crocker following suit on WBLS days later.

Stone – “Girl I Like the Way that You Move (Dub Mix)” (1982)

With its squeaky toy keys and rubbery bassline, the second single from disco-funk band Stone felt a bit like child's play. “Girl I Like the Way that You Move” didn't dent the charts, but over the years, the delirious dub mix from unheralded duo Nick Martinelli and David Todd has become a boogie essential. Bubbly, slippery, and topped with a vibraphone solo, the song has been featured in mixes from everyone from DJ Spinna to Motor City Drum Ensemble.

Shirley Lites – “Heat You Up (Melt You Down) (Melt Down Mix)” (1983)

There are only two singles to the name “Shirley Lites” (be it singers or producers, it's not quite clear), but one of them is an all-time classic. Not a hit at the time, “Heat You Up (Melt You Down)” teeters among disco, boogie, and hi-NRG with its swooning synths, cocaine-twitchy guitar, sensuous tom-toms, and strange basslines slushing in the background. Martinelli and Todd's “Melt Down Mix” turns these elements into spilled mercury, refashioning the silvery track in such a manner as to anticipate the future sounds of techno and house.

Barbara Mason – “Another Man” (1983)

Few singers have been as resilient to pop's slippery trends as Barbara Mason. She scored her first hit with the virginal teen pop of “Yes, I'm Ready” in 1965, switched it up a few years later with a slinky funk take on Curtis Mayfield's “Give Me Your Love,” then went electro-boogie in the early ’80s with the salacious “Another Man.” The song's proto-techno throb of synth bass and skittering drum machine, later sampled by Notorious B.I.G. and the Black Madonna, powers the tale of a woman wronged—though by another man, not a woman. Some lines may scan as insensitive now, but the song was a huge hit in gay clubs and throughout ballroom culture.