Because putting together the Phew/Aunt Sally post made me think of them and because I need a unicorn chaser after that cheesy thing I posted just now (ironically from the same time period as this), Here’s The Fall, live in Leeds, doing one of the best odes to speed that I know of, aside from this one or (duh!) this one. I drunk a jar of coffee and then I took some of these !

 
Bonus : another version, this one live in NYC. Mark E. Smith improvising tons of lyrics. Bzzzzzzzz !

Possibly the first song I ever heard by the Fall.
I think it was some dumb, mainstream New Wave-ish radio show where the DJ introduced it as “the worst song I’ve ever heard”. Loved it then and love it now.
OK, so I nominate the Hawkwind, Kings of Speed single B-side Motorhead as the fourth greatest speed song.

Oh yeah !

Big Black “Racer X” for number 5.

Got a big white X
On the top of his car
Rex keeps his speed
In a little glass jar

The first time I did methamphetamine was at an afterparty for the Fall. I was watching them hoovering up lines of powder thinking to myself “Oh, these English Rock Stars and their bloody cocaine when the drummer asked me if I’d like a snort so I asked if it was coke- “no, mate have some sulphate”,I did and, combined with the two other forms of speed I had gobbled before the show, led to one of the more “electrifying” weekends that I can remember. Never again. oh no, never again.

Great song. And good call on the Byrds one, from their best album.