Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a heavy drinker; also in attrib. use [piss n. (3b) + -head sfx (4)].

1979		D. Maitland Breaking Out 59: The bloke’s nothing but a piss-head.
1987		Eble Campus Sl. Fall.
1985		‘Thommo’ Dict. Aus. Swearing & Sex Sayings 95: PISS HEAD — Similar to piss tank, drinks too much piss or beer.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 84/2: pisshead heavy drinker; possibly first in NZ.
1999		Guardian Friday Rev. 11 June 15: Now, he says, he’s just a pisshead.
1999		R.G. Barrett Wind & Monkey (2013) [ebook] ‘A real pisshead’s face. Got a nose looks like a dog sleeps in it’.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].
2004		R.G. Barrett Rosa Marie’s Baby (2013) [ebook] ‘That Yank [...] was just a pisshead’.
2005		B. Hare Urban Grimshaw 11: A fucking piss-head [...] I thought you were different, you piss-head bastard!
2011		J.J. Connolly Viva La Madness 83: Wanted to be one of the chaps [...] pisshead plastic gangster.
2017		Guardian CiF 2 Jan. 🌐 Doesn't make everyone a pisshead but thinking it's [i.e. over-drinking] not a problem is stupid.
2021		P Howard Braywatch 49: I was too much of a pisshead at the time.

2. an obnoxious person [piss n. (1) + -head sfx (4)].

1970		D. Ponicsan Last Detail 176: Shut the fucking hatch, piss-head!
1979		S. King Dead Zone (1980) 349: The one that made such a pisshead of herself when her ‘precious daughter’ fainted at the lawn party that afternoon.
1986		L. Heinemann Paco’s Story (1987) 77: Any half-bright, lard-assed nitwit who can comb hair can goddam cut hair in the Army. All those pissheads know is zip-zap-zip.
1999		Guardian G2 29 Nov. 17: Graham-Dixon’s problem is that Giotto wasn’t enough of a pisshead.
2006		T. Huelskamp Movable Parts 119: And you’d better have exact fuckin’ change pisshead!
2011		S. Kelman Pigeon English 31: The other pissheads were waiting outside.