[shakna]

> A lisp with type inference and performance is quite rare.

You mean apart from several Scheme implementations?

Chez Scheme is blisteringly fast, and on-par with C for quite a few things.

Gambit-C (Compiles to C), Chicken (based on the Cheney-on-the-MTA model) and Bigloo (designed to replace C++) also deserve a reference here.

[metaobject]

Bigloo has a special place in my heart. I spent a few years building scheme bindings to various C graphics and networking libraries. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I found it very enjoyable. Getting C-like performance from scheme is just wonderful.

[baldfat]

Racket which is moving to a Chez Scheme top and you can further go with typed Racket seems to fit that 'rare' category.