Racer-X

Iain Burgess recorded it in Chicago, and the title came from the masked character in Speed Racer, which the title track references repeatedly. The original cover art was by Nate Kaatrud of Urge Overkill, and when Touch and Go reissued the EP in 1992 the artwork could not be found and a new cover was made. Il Duce, a song about Mussolini, came from the same session. Albini said he was aiming for a big, massive, slick rock sound, but later felt the EP was too samey and monolithic, and the last line of the liner notes promised that the next record would make listeners shit their pants.

Trouser Press found it less obsessively cranky than the first two records and listed its basic elements as one-riff industrial funk grooves, coarse vocals and jagged guitar played with steel picks, though not as idiosyncratically brilliant as Lungs. The Japandroids covered the title track in a Daytrotter session on 15 December 2009 and called the original a masterpiece.