Terror on Tour

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.

What's more fun than seeing KISS-lookalike rock group members mutilate the pretty female groupies in and out of their concerts? If exploitation is your thing, then this'll be the perfect movie for you! This one came from Don Edmonds, who directed the violent exploitation classic ILSA, SHE-WOLF OF THE S.S. You know you're in for some mindless and tasteless fun, so dig deep through the bargain bin! Come across TERROR ON TOUR and tell the cashier that Jason Atwood of Virginia sent ya'!

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.

This movie was hard for me to watch without falling asleep, but I stayed awake for me to reveil how this movie was. There was little suspense, you knew what this movie was about from beginning to end. just another slasher/mystery movie that had little to watch out for and little enthusiasm in the film. This movie is a tale about a KISS look alike rock group called The Clowns (what a name) that basically goes and lives the fantasy of every rock musician (girls, beer, lame music and no backbone). But this movie tells about the mysterious killer from the beginning of the movie so it leaves little suspense for the viewer to look for. This movie is one of the most lame movies of the 80's when lame rock movies started coming out. I give this one a 3.

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.