motörhead is often credited as the first band to invent/play speed metal. some of speed metal's earlier influences include deep purple's "fireball" and queen's "stone cold crazy" (which was eventually covered by the thrash metal band metallica), from their 1974 album "sheer heart attack", and deep purple's song "highway star", from their album "machine head". the latter was called 'early speed metal' by robb reiner of speed metal band anvil. led zeppelin's "communication breakdown", first released in january 1969, could also be said to be an early template for speed metal as mentioned in mac randall's.