"Part Time Punks" is a song by the English post-punk group Television Personalities. It initially appeared on their 1978 EP Where's Bill Grundy Now?, and was released by Rough Trade Records as a single in 1980. Written by lead singer Dan Treacy and composed by the band, the song satirise the late-comer, fashion-oriented, so-called "plastic" punks who appeared after the English punk rock movement became mainstream.
The single sold about 27,000 copies in its first year and brought Television Personalities to prominence within the then-emerging independent music scene. Though it was one of the band's best-selling releases, Treacy came to regard the track as a millstone and somewhat of a novelty song.
Background
The Television Personalities' vocalist and songwriter Dan Treacy was born and raised in Beaufort Market on the King's Road in central London.[1] Their apartment was located opposite the fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and entrepreneur Malcolm McLaren's "Sex" boutique (later known as "The World's End"), which specialised in clothing often credited with establishing the aesthetic of the punk movement.[2] Treacy was thus aware of punk rock from its earliest beginnings and said of living across from the Sex boutique that his "mum used to do their dry cleaning...you see all the stars up here. I must see Steve Jones five times a week. Gene October. They all go in there, Charlie Watts, Diana Dors".[3] Through her contacts at Sex, Treacy's mother was able to get him a job working at Led Zeppelin's record label Swan song, where he acted as a gofer. He said this mainly involved "running errands carrying cocaine up and down the Fulham Palace Road".[4]
Treacy formed the band after hearing the Sex Pistols.[4] Unconventional by nature, he has admitted that he was not very interested in music at the time and that the band rarely rehearsed.[5] The band struggled to decide on a name; early suggestions included the names of well-known but by then old-fashioned UK TV hosts such as Nicholas Parsons, Russell Harty, Bruce Forsyth and Hughie Green. They eventually decided on the related but generic "Television Personalities".[4]
Recording and distribution
Dan Treacy performing with the Television Personalities in Japan, April 1994.
Treacy borrowed £18 from his parents to record off-peak at a small studio in Hammersmith, London. The first tracks recorded were "14th Floor" and "Oxford Street". Both songs were well received, while "14th Floor" was chosen for airplay by The Clash's singer Joe Strummer during guest appearances on John Peel's influential BBC Radio 1 evening show.[4] The band decided to record a four-track EP, eventually titled Where's Bill Grundy Now? and consisting of "Part Time Punks", the title track, "Happy Families" and "Posing at the Roundhouse".[6]
Treacy wanted to release "Part Time Punks" as a single. However, he misjudged production costs, and after the recording and mastering were complete, he was unable to press any vinyl copies and was left with only two acetates.[7][8] He sent a copy to John Peel, who played the track four times over the following 12 months and offered the band a Peel Session.[8][9] Peel was dissapointed when he heard that the song had been left out of the session in favour of newer material, he said: "Oh, it's such a shame that children have to grow up".[10]Geoff Travis, the head of Rough Trade Records contacted Treacy and released the single in 1980.[11] The record reached the UK Independent Chart, selling 14,000 copies in the first six months, leading to a further pressing of 13,000 copies. The song brought the band international attention and led to tours of America, Germany and Holland.[8]
Treacy and Ball formed the Independent record label "Whaam! Records", and released several other self-financed singles.[12] However, the project had to be renamed "Dreamworld" after they received a cease and desist letter from legal representatives of George Michael of the pop group Wham!, who paid an undisclosed sum to get the duo to stop using the name.[13] Treacy said in a 2010 interview that "Part Time Punks" and their debut album "...And Don't the Kids Just Love It" were the band's most commercially successful releases. He said that at the time "I was absolutely minted, big record, big album. The money came too young. "Part Time Punks" done getting on 100,000, not that I see anything for it these days. I may do eventually."[14]
The track was written by Treacy,[15] and was recorded in the band's characteristic low-fi and deliberately shambolic style. Treacy's lyrics incorporate vernacular language and are sung with a pronounced London accent and a storytelling intonation. Adding to the amateurish tone, both Treacy and Ball appear to struggle with keeping their vocal harmonies in tune.[16]
The lyrics take a critical and satirical look at the evolution of punk rock from its underground beginnings in the mid-1970s to the more commercialised, mainstream late–1970s style.[17] According to the music critic Rob Young, the song reflects the "transference of the earnest imperatives behind punk rock into a pastiche" and satires "the cartoon-mohican punk rockers that had taken over the King's Road as helpless fashion victims ignorant of the founding spirit of punk rock."[18] Writing for LA Weekly in 2006, the critic Lina Lecaro described the song as criticising poseurs and late adopters "who rock the look only on the weekend".[19] Treacy re-explored the theme in the -far darker- title track of the 1995 album "I Was a Mod Before You Was a Mod".[13]
Part Time Punks mentions several contemporary bands, music industry people and record labels, including Siouxsie and the Banshees, John Peel and Rough Trade. However, Treacy has said that the song wasn't intended to criticise them directly. More so, in the words of critic Ian Birch, the song highlights "the kind of unthinking acceptance that people can adopt towards figureheads."[20] Asked in a 1980 interview with Sounds magazine if he was once a part-time punk, Treacy said: "Oh Christ yeah, I'm the worst of the lot. If there was a review in Sounds saying this is a good album I'd go and but it...The other night I was looking over the road, not with me telescope, and there was actually someone pogoing in their bedroom. That's when I realised everybody takes it too seriously."[3]
Reception and influence
"Part Time Punks" has become a cult hit[14] and has been widely influential. According to the writer Simon Reynolds is song acts as a self-referentialmeta critique addressing the nature of the punk movement itself.[21]
The writer Kelefa Sanneh said that with "Part Time Punks", "Dan Treacy led what sounded like a bedroom sing-along, poking fun at young people practising their punk moves at home. The verses were rather judgmental, but by the time he got to the chorus, Treacy sounded more like a small boy watching a delightful parade."[22]
Elements of its style were adopted by UK indie bands such as Belle and Sebastian and Arctic Monkeys. It appeared on the 1995 TVP early singles and B-sides compilation "Yes Darling, But Is It Art",[23] while the 1999 'Best of' album "Part Time Punks: The Very Best Of Television Personalities" was titled after the song.[24]
Berton, Benjamin (2022). Dreamworld: The fabulous life of Daniel Treacy and his band Television Personalities. Mainz: Black Dog Publishing. ISBN978-3-9557-5621-5.
Birch, Ian (10 February 1979). "Rough Trade Records: The Humane Sell". Melody Maker.
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