Biography
Philadelphia's Duran Duran Duran, whose real name is Ed Flis, surfaced in the early 2000s as one of the American breakcore scene's most notorious figures, generating some of the style's most chaotic and destructive material before relocating to Berlin and adopting an aggressive electro-techno approach. During his teenage years Flis took part in several punk and hip-hop ensembles, then launched his noisy electronic project Duran Duran Duran in 1999 while enrolled at Drexel University. At first the project operated as a collaboration involving Flis, Michael Chaiken of Dance Chromatic, and Tony Gabor, yet Flis quickly emerged as its most visible participant, handling live performances himself and circulating self-released CD-Rs among interested listeners. The early Duran Duran Duran recordings fused gabber and jungle into an extremely volatile mixture, drawing prominent influence from Digital Hardcore acts such as Shizuo and Christoph De Babalon as well as ragga-core producers like DJ Scud. Flis also drew heavily on the early-’90s hardcore rave scene, citing both the inventive sample-based productions of outfits such as Hyper On Experience and the drug-fueled hedonism that defined the events themselves. Typical Duran Duran Duran tracks stacked samples ranging from speed metal guitar riffs to Ace of Base hits atop high-velocity breakbeats while making frequent allusions to drugs and pornography.
Flis played countless shows, often in bars or basements, alongside fellow breakcore producers including Jason Forrest, Dev/Null, and Xanopticon, attracting considerable notice within the United States yet even greater interest across Europe, where hard electronic music enjoys far wider popularity. Multiple Duran Duran Duran pieces surfaced on compilations and split EPs while Flis prepared the project’s first full-length release. That album was originally slated for Irritant Records; an early version titled Drunk on Cock received airplay from John Peel shortly before the broadcaster’s death. Retitled Very Pleasure, the record finally appeared in early 2005 on Forrest’s Cock Rock Disco imprint.
After issuing a handful of limited CD-R EPs and the 2006 EP Blow Job Breaks on Mutant Sniper, Duran Duran Duran reached Planet Mu in 2007 with the single “Face Blast,” which bore a strong Miami booty bass imprint. Although Flis kept producing breakcore, his tracks gradually moved away from breakbeats and toward harder variants of techno, electro, and bass music. Following a one-sided 7-inch on Hirntrust Grind Media, split 12-inches with Society Suckers and General Malice, and remixes for Otto Von Schirach and Kid606, the second Duran Duran Duran album Over Hard arrived in 2010, again via Cock Rock Disco. Now based in Berlin, Flis continued to perform, create original material and remixes, and joined software developer Ableton in 2013. Tigerbeat6 issued his digital EP Rejectro the next year. In 2017 the track “Drap Jam” appeared on the Power Vacuum compilation Vectors 3; later the same year the U.K. label released Duran Duran Duran’s third album, simply titled Duran.
Flis played countless shows, often in bars or basements, alongside fellow breakcore producers including Jason Forrest, Dev/Null, and Xanopticon, attracting considerable notice within the United States yet even greater interest across Europe, where hard electronic music enjoys far wider popularity. Multiple Duran Duran Duran pieces surfaced on compilations and split EPs while Flis prepared the project’s first full-length release. That album was originally slated for Irritant Records; an early version titled Drunk on Cock received airplay from John Peel shortly before the broadcaster’s death. Retitled Very Pleasure, the record finally appeared in early 2005 on Forrest’s Cock Rock Disco imprint.
After issuing a handful of limited CD-R EPs and the 2006 EP Blow Job Breaks on Mutant Sniper, Duran Duran Duran reached Planet Mu in 2007 with the single “Face Blast,” which bore a strong Miami booty bass imprint. Although Flis kept producing breakcore, his tracks gradually moved away from breakbeats and toward harder variants of techno, electro, and bass music. Following a one-sided 7-inch on Hirntrust Grind Media, split 12-inches with Society Suckers and General Malice, and remixes for Otto Von Schirach and Kid606, the second Duran Duran Duran album Over Hard arrived in 2010, again via Cock Rock Disco. Now based in Berlin, Flis continued to perform, create original material and remixes, and joined software developer Ableton in 2013. Tigerbeat6 issued his digital EP Rejectro the next year. In 2017 the track “Drap Jam” appeared on the Power Vacuum compilation Vectors 3; later the same year the U.K. label released Duran Duran Duran’s third album, simply titled Duran.
Albums
Singles
