"Motorhead" is a song written by Ian "Lemmy" Kilmister while he was a member of the English space rock band Hawkwind.

Lemmy explains how it was created: I was on tour with Hawkwind in 1974, we were staying at the Riot House and Roy Wood and Wizzard were also in town.

I ran downstairs to the Wizzard room, got Roy's Ovation acoustic guitar, then hurried back to mine.

The lyrics were explained by Lemmy: The six thousand miles was a reference to Los Angeles, and the rest is self-explanatory.

The bass follows the root note for all the chords, with a riff on the F♯, based on the A string between the tenth and twelfth frets.

[3] There is a jazz-inspired violin solo break by keyboard player Simon House which, based on the verse/pre-chorus/chorus pattern, occurs after the second chorus.

In July 1981 "Motorhead" was released as the A-side to a 7" and 12" single on the Flicknife label, this time having a Brock vocal and synthesizer overdubs, the B-side being "Valium Ten".

The track "Motorhead" is credited to Lemmy, the B-side, "City Kids", to Duncan Sanderson and Larry Wallis, who had originally recorded the song with their band the Pink Fairies for their album Kings of Oblivion.

[3] The single uses recordings made in March 1981 while the band were on their four-day "The Short, Sharp, Pain in the Neck Tour", as were the other tracks on the parent album, No Sleep 'til Hammersmith.

[8] In 2008, the song was re-recorded as downloadable content for the rhythm game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, along with "Stay Clean" and "(We Are) The Road Crew".