by Eduardo RivadaviaNew York's Riot is unfortunate representative of a "lost generation" of American hard rock bands. Formed in the late '70s, when widespread record industry recession conspired with disco's airwave domination and headline-grabbing (but little-album-selling) punk rock to drive even some of the decade's most successful heavyweight dinosaurs (Black Sabbath, Kiss, etc.) to the brink of extinction, Riot saw precious few of their contemporaries (most notably Van Halen) actually make it through to the big time. Not so lucky as the California quartet, Riot had to seek out a foreign label to take a chance on their stellar eponymous debut in 1977, and then financed a second, Narita, on their own dime before managing to lure a still rather hesitant Capitol Records to pick it up. Finally released in late 1979, Narita was named after the Japanese airport controversially built on sacred ground (hence its bizarre album cover) and contained slick but powerful hard rock -- nowhere near as combustible as VH'