Speed Demon

THE STORY BEHIND ' Speed Demon '

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This is one of the most eccentric and experimental tracks on the Bad album. The story below details Michael’s real-life obsession with fast driving, the groundbreaking claymation video, and how he turned a traffic ticket into a funk masterpiece.

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"Speed Demon" was born on the freeway. By the mid-1980s, Michael Jackson was living a life of extreme isolation, but one of the few freedoms he enjoyed was driving. He loved driving fast.

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According to Quincy Jones, the inspiration for the song came after Michael received a speeding ticket. Michael was reportedly late for a recording session at Westlake Studios and was caught driving well over the limit. When he arrived at the studio, rather than being upset, he started tapping out a rhythm that mimicked the feeling of the engine revving and the adrenaline of the chase. He wrote the lyrics as a cautionary tale, a man pushing his machine to the limit to outrun his problems (and the police) but delivered with a sense of rebellious fun.

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The "Industrial" Funk Musically, "Speed Demon" is a radical departure from the smooth R&B of Thriller. It is gritty, mechanical, and intentionally "ugly" in its funkiness.

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The song opens with the sound of a motorcycle revving its engine and peeling out. This wasn't just a stock sound effect; it was processed through the Synclavier synthesizer to give it a musical pitch. The entire track is built around this concept of "machine music." The bassline is a synthesized, staccato pulse that mimics the pistons of an engine.

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The percussion is incredibly complex. Michael and the production team layered sounds of metal clanging, gears grinding, and heavy breathing to create the rhythm track. It creates a chaotic, claustrophobic atmosphere that perfectly captures the feeling of speeding down a highway with the "pull over!" lights flashing in the rearview mirror.

 

The "Percussive" Voice Michael’s vocal delivery on "Speed Demon" is one of his most aggressive. He treats his voice almost exclusively as a percussion instrument.

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Listen to the verses: he chops every word into tiny, rhythmic pieces. Lines like "Look in the mirror... at the face... you see" are spat out rather than sung. He uses his signature "hiccup" technique to fill the gaps between the beat.

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In the chorus, his voice changes. He layers multiple harmonies to create a swirling, dizzying effect on the line "Speed Demon... you're the very same one." It creates a sonic representation of motion sickness or the blur of passing streetlights.

 

Moonwalker While "Speed Demon" was never released as a commercial single, it is famous for its music video, which served as a centerpiece segment in Michael’s 1988 anthology film, "Moonwalker".

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Michael wanted to do something totally unique for the video. He partnered with Will Vinton, the creator of "Claymation" (famous for the California Raisins). Vinton and his team of animators created a surreal world where Michael transforms into a clay rabbit named Spike.

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The plot of the video involves Michael (in human form) trying to escape a mob of crazed tourists and paparazzi. He finds a disguises in a movie studio prop room and transforms into the leather-clad rabbit, Spike. What follows is a "Looney Tunes" style chase scene involving a motorcycle.

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The most technically impressive part of the video is the "dance off." At the end of the segment, the clay rabbit challenges the real Michael Jackson to a dance battle. The animators had to study Michael’s movements frame-by-frame to make the clay rabbit move exactly like him. Seeing the real Michael dance interactively with a stop-motion character was groundbreaking visual effects work for 1988, predating Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

 

Beneath the cartoonish exterior, the video (and the song) explores a darker theme: Michael’s desire to escape his own fame.

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In the video, the antagonists are not police, but tourists and photographers (The "Press") who morph into clay monsters. They claw at him and chase him relentlessly. "Speed Demon" essentially represents Michael’s fantasy of having a vehicle fast enough to outrun the "monster" of celebrity. The disguise of the rabbit allows him to be mischievous and free, something he couldn't be in his real life.

 

One musical detail that musicians often note is the time signature and tempo changes. The song feels fast because of the lyrics and the sound effects, but the actual tempo is a heavy, mid-tempo stomp.

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There is a breakdown in the middle of the song where the beat drops out, and a saxophone solo (played by Kim Hutchcroft) weaves in and out of a synthesizer solo (played by Larry Williams). This jazz-fusion interlude is chaotic and dissonant, further enhancing the "out of control" vibe of the track.

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As it wasn't a radio single, "Speed Demon" remains a "deep cut" treasured by hardcore fans. It was never performed live on the Bad tour or any subsequent tour.

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However, recently, the bassline of "Speed Demon" has been recognized as a precursor to the "New Jack Swing" sound that Michael would fully embrace on his next album, Dangerous. The song stands as a bridge between the analog funk of the past and the industrial, digital future of 90s R&B.

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It is Michael Jackson at his most playful and weird, a superstar turning a speeding ticket into a piece of avant-garde pop art, starring a claymation rabbit.