Part Time Punks

"Part Time Punks"
Single by Television Personalities
Released	1980
Genre	Post Punk Indie rock
Length	2:37
Label	Rough Trade
Songwriter(s)	Dan Tracey
Television Personalities singles chronology
"14th Floor" (1978) "Part Time Punks" (1980) "I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives" (1981)

"Part Time Punks" is a song by the English post-punk group Television Personalities. Written in 1978 by band leader and vocalist Dan Treacy, it was released as a single in 1980 on Rough Trade Records. The record features Treacy, fellow teenager and school friend Ed Ball, and drummer Mark Sheppard.

"Part Time Punks" was first released as part of their 1978 four song^[A] EP "Where's Bill Grundy Now?".^[B] Treacy self-financed the EP, in part with a loan from his parents. He had intended to release the song as a single immediately after, but was unable to afford to press the 7-inch singles. When a copy of the track was picked up by the BBC DJ John Peel, Treacy was offered a number of record deals before eventually signing with Rough Trade. Their 1980 release of the single brought the Television Personalities to prominence within the then emerging independent music scene, selling an estimated 27,000 copies in its first year.

The lyrics are a humour-infused satire of the late-comer, fashion-oriented, “plastic” punks who emerged c 1979 after the English punk rock movement emerged from the underground and went mainstream, especially after Bill Grundy's infamous live TV interview with the Sex Pistols on the 'Today' programme in 1976, during which the band swore and after which the TV host was fired from the ITV network.^[1]

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