Epilepsy Warning: The following entry contains flashing images.

About

Party Hard is a catchphrase used to express that one should party in an intense way by giving it all. The phrase gained its popularity after the 2001 song "Party Hard" by Andrew W.K. In memes, the phrase has often been paired with flashing GIFs of people and characters moving or dancing in a violent, erratic way.

Origin

The first documented uses of the expression "party hard" predate Andrew W.K. by at least two decades. For example, the phrase appears in the lyrics of the song "Gonna Party" in the episode "Gunge the Great and Glorious" of the children puppet show Fraggle Rock that premiered in May 1985 (lyrics seen below).^[1][2]

Yeah, Papa, don't be late,
Don't hang back when the party's starting.
Mama, don't you wait,
Come and you party hard.

On October 29th, 2001, rock singer Andrew W.K released his song "Party Hard" as a single (music video shown below).^[3] The song received positive reviews from critics and became Andrew W.K.'s first mainstream success, helping to popularize the phrase.

When it's time to party, we will party hard
Hey!

In June 2002, Something Awful user Buffington Post^[4] posted "Andrew_wk.gif," a two-frame GIF of Andrew W.K. captioned "PARTY HARD," with the text flashing yellow and red (shown below).

Spread

In the following months, Something Awful users posted more similarly styled GIFs inspired by Andrew_wk.gif. On March 26th, 2003, Something Awful^[5] user Fuckstick started a thread titled "In this thread we PARTY HARD!!!!" In the thread, users posted other Party Hard GIFs, with the thread receiving nearly 360 replies.

I am always seeing party hard macros everywhere on these forums, but I have never seen them all together in one place. This is the party hard thread! I wish I could actually put the song in here so it would actually feel like a party but oh well. Dig up your .gifs and share them so we can always PARTY HARD!!!!

On March 29th, 2003, Something Awful^[6] user Sepherotic created a thread for music videos based on the GIFs posted in the March 26th thread.

In the following years, the Party Hard trend spread to other sites, primarily 4chan. On March 15th, 2008, as a part of Project Chanology, Anonymous organized "Operation: Party Hard" during which they protested in front of Churches of Scientology (video shown below).^[7]

Andrew W.K.'s 4chan Q&A

On February 13, 2011, at 7 p.m. EST, Andrew W.K.^[8][9][10] held a Q&A on 4chan's /mu/ music board across two threads. The site temporarily crashed due to a large influx of users.

First of all, I'm so happy to be here and I'm really grateful to 4chan, moot, gingermod, and shut for having me. And thank you to EVERYONE at 4chan for making this place what it is.
To answer your question about BECOMING a party, if you have to ask, you already are.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References