Demon Rock

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 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.

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'!

There is absolutely nothing redeeming or interesting about this film. There are no moments even worth mentioning and there were no characters that were the least bit intriguing. It was all shot in the dark and everything was shadowed. Every scene is dark and most of the time you can't even tell who is talking because it's so shadowed you can't see their mouth. The premise of the movie is idiotic. Like that idea hasn't been done a million times before.

Question: why is it that movies that wish to involve attractive women always resort to killing them because of their "morals." Every movie you see with "hot chicks" that are murdered always ends up being because they were thought to be loose women that didn't deserve to live. There's some white guy who thinks these women should die - kind of like that real life case that we just learned about of the guy who killed prostitutes after he had sex with them. This guy murdered over 50 women in real life. Horror movies caught on to this idea way before this guy was busted. Why is this? Is it because we really think this in society? I'm serious, this is not the only movie that does this, there are TONS. I just don't get it. Or is that the only excuse the writers can some up with that enables the viewer to see the ladies topless. After all, any woman that takes off her shirt has got to be immoral and a whore, right? Any woman that is pretty deserves to die, right?

Anyway, despite my obvious disapproval from this rant, the movie sucked even more than that. The music was generic and horrible, the Clowns' outfits weren't the least bit sexy, the characters didn't have anything unique about them, the movie moved really slowly and I found it hard to believe any word that came out of any character's mouth because either I couldn't see which character was even saying it, or because no one talks like that. The writing was bad and the acting was bad. Bad bad bad bad.

1/10. If I could have given it a 0, I would have.

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.