While not as well known as many songs on I’m In Your Mind Fuzz, “Satan Speeds Up” is one of those oddball tunes that’s as endearing as it is rare. With heavy tape effects, loads of wah wah and some intense tremolo, the song is a great slower tune for the back half of the album, no matter how satanic it may be. The focus is on religion and how humanity’s “silly games” (war, industrialization, etc.) create a world of chaos and instability since God’s creation. At every second we’re being judged for these actions, yet we still continue.
It’s certainly a cynical look at belief and the song carries an unsettling eeriness to it.
“Satan Speeds Up” was first played on 2014-02-09 at St Kilda Foreshore in Naarm (Melbourne) as part of a set containing many Mind Fuzz debuts. According to the setlist, the song’s working title was “Hip Hop,” perhaps due to the song’s drum beat. The song would then drop off the setlists immediately afterwards, to a point where very few people even knew it was ever played at all. This was made worse by the fact that no recordings of its debut exist. The studio version of the song was recorded by Paul Maybury at A Secret Location in Melbourne, with a mix done by Stu on tour. I’m In Your Mind Fuzz would be released on October 31st, 2014 with the song being its penultimate track.
A music video by Jason Galea and Peter Burr was released on November 6th, 2014. Initially teased in a promotional video for Mind Fuzz, it follows the band wearing different outfits as they do various activities around New York. Eric wears black glasses, a jacket, and hat while walking around with a cane the hand of a mannequin poking out of his sleeve. Lucas is continuously running in a winter coat and hands Ambrose money during the beginning of the video. Ambrose is a skateboarder wearing a gray beanie. Cook is a dog with face paint and fur blanket. He urinates on a fire hydrant and is led around by Stu, who sings while wearing a devil mask and red dress. Joey wears a pom beanie while smoking and posing throughout the video. Cavs gets his laundry done and dresses up like a pimp with a clear umbrella.
The video was shot around October 30th/31st and was lip-synched with a slowed down version of the track which was then sped up during editing. Outtakes from the shoot can be found at 44:14 of the band’s documentary BOOTLEG HOLIDAY FROM HELL
In a Reddit AMA from May of 2022, Galea would state that it was the video he had the most fun making, with Stu also having it on his list of favorites. Cook’s appearance in the video would later be referenced on the poster for 2019-07-05.
For almost a decade “Satan Speeds Up” went completely missing. When a Twitter user (appropriately named @satanspeedsup) mentioned how much they wished that the song was played on 2015-07-06, the official King Gizzard account responded “that songs way too hard man.”
The song didn’t reappear until the early show at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colorado on 2023-06-08. Ambrose introduced the song as one that they had never played before, but Stu corrected him and explained what happened on 2014-02-09. “Actually we did play it once... No, we played it once. We played it once in 2014 at St. Kilda fest, I remember, and it went really badly so we never played it again.” Ambrose then responded “that’s probably why I deleted it from my memory.”
It was played two more times in 2023, one time at The Salt Shed in Chicago (2023-06-11) and another time at Parco Della Musica in Padua (2023-08-22).
Live versions of the song are close to the album and feature no jamming.