Terror on Tour

I'm a fan of 80's metal. I'm a fan of 80's horror movies. Put the two together, and what do you get? Well, if you're lucky, ROCKTOBER BLOOD (1984). Or you might get TERROR ON TOUR (1980), but that's not too shabby.

The Clowns are a rock band who wear clown make-up and half a clown mask across the right side of their faces. Someone sporting their concert get-up is murdering prostitutes and various groupies at their concerts. Who could it be? TERROR ON TOUR certainly isn't for everyone. The acting isn't great, the killer is goofy, the identity of the killer is obvious, and it's pretty sleazy to boot. But, being the die-hard slasher fan that I am, I really enjoyed it. Sure, it's not as good as ROCKTOBER BLOOD, but what can you do.

The acting wasn't TOO bad; it was more tolerable than anything. The people who played The Clowns were a real band called The Names, so you have to at least give them credit for trying.

The kills aren't too bloody or even original (it's all stabbing with a large knife), but they (mostly) come rapid fire and I'm in a forgiving mood, so I'll let it slide. The killer's identity is obvious (any four-year old who's seen more than one episode of Scooby-Doo can guess it), and his motive is really, really stupid.

On the rock scale, I'd say it gets a decent 3/4 mannequin be-headings. There are a lot of catchy rock songs, but none of them are very memorable. The runtime was short, but I never felt that it was boring; just a little repetitive.

Anyway, TERROR ON TOUR was a treat for an undemanding eighties slasher fanatic like myself. So if you're in the mood for a little rock and slashing and your VHS of ROCKTOBER BLOOD just broke, check this out.

The Clowns are rocking hard on stage.Their energetic and insanely cheesy performance includes decapitating mannequins.During the show a dealer is murdered and the groupies are dying stabbed to death whilst being semi-naked.Is the killer a crazed band member?Or perhaps a nutty fan?"Terror on Tour" is an ugly and very dull slasher movie directed by Don "Ilsa:She Wolf of the SS" Edmonds.The direction is lame,the acting is poor and the characters are bland and annoying.Even the horror and stalk-and-slash scenes leave something to be desired.The killings are just stabbings and there is a bit of blood and plenty of naked female flesh.5 clowns out of 10.

The producers of this crap owe the horror fans a BIG apology.

There's no way they could have been serious. This was a sorry excuse for a comedy. They tried gore for no reason other than they knew the joke was flat.

This gets one star for the idea, and another for the concert scenes. Even though the music was worse than anything I could think of.

Deaths follow a metal band on tour.

Did they do it?

Will you care?

No!!!

Put it back and rent something else.

"Terror on Tour" is a lousy, putrid and terribly annoying attempt at occult slasher/Rocksploitation movie from the director of the infamous first two "Ilsa" flicks; - namely "She-Wolf of the SS" and "Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks". I've seen copious amounts of 80's slashers already and there are definitely more bad ones than good ones, but "Terror on Tour" is absolute bottom-of-the-barrel unendurable guff. The film lacks anything that remotely resembles a screenplay, the killings are dull and monotonous, the decors and cinematography are ugly, the acting performances are embarrassing and even the numerous topless girls flaunting in front of the cameras are irritating. A couple of losers form a rock band together, called The Clowns, and before as well as during and after every gig the concert hall transforms into one giant orgy with drugs, horny groupies and on-stage violence. Their looks are inspired by KISS and every band member is disguised, so we can't tell which clown is responsible for the gruesome knife- killings that are occurring after their concerts. The band members remain uninterested and unworried, even when more and more groupie-corpses are piling up around them, so why should us viewers wonder who's committing the murders? The killer is probably a very angry Gene Simmons because he didn't give permission to imitate his facial make-up. There, case closed! Most of the killing sequences in early 80's slasher movies are extremely misogynic and sexist, but the chicks in "Terror on Tour" truly deserve what's coming to them… They literally just throw their naked selves to any musician with a mask and paint on his hideous face, and then they look surprised when a knife is planted deep in their A-cup sized chests. This dud definitely earns a spot in my bottom 5 worst 80's slasher list, next to other hopeless titles such as "Blood Lake", "The Stay Awake", "Appointment with Fear", "Hollow Gate" and "Sledgehammer".

The Clowns are a shock rock group who look like a cross between The Sensational Alex Harvey Band, Sgt Kabukiman and your average Goth and like to pretend to stab, mutilate and kill groupies on stage. It becomes problematic when someone starts to actually kill groupies who have come to see the band in real life.

Terror on Tape was made in 1980 and so the shock rock aspect seems a bit passe. It would have been cooler if it was made in the early/mid 70's when Alice Cooper was becoming famous. But, nonetheless, it's still a solid and entertaining yarn. The make-up the band members wear makes it easy for someone to imitate them or to make it harder to ascertain which band member is bumping off the pretty young women who surround the band. The backstage area is also eerily deserted when the band is onstage, and so this also makes the murders easier.

The movie also captures something that you don't see in modern movies that try to portray the early 80's, and that is the amount of wood panelling that was used for interiors. Youngsters nowadays think the era was all pastel colours and neon. It wasn't. It was wood panelling.

Terror on Tour isn't bad, but it's far from being some forgotten masterpiece, either.

Fun fact 1- Alex Rebar, who was the lead in The Incredible Melting Man, is one of the executive producers on this movie.

Fun fact 2- The guy (Larry Thomas) who plays the notorious 'Soup Nazi' character from Seinfeld is one of the band members.