UFO - No Place To Run (1980)

The first studio recording after the departure of guitarist Michael Schenker, No Place to Run set into motion UFO's critical and commercial decline. While only a slight adjustment to the band's successful hard rock formula, the midtempo guitar rock bore much more of a resemblance to fading '70s rockers like Bad Company than the coming NWOBHM. Fellow Brits like Def Leppard were cultivating a similar but much more exciting brand of simple, angular hard rock built for the millions of AC/DC-loving Americans, while UFO seemed to be chasing their stylistic tail. Louder and way more energetic, Def Leppard were poised to overtake the rock universe while UFO languished on No Place to Run. Tracks like "This Fire Burns Tonight" call to mind Jackson Brown-styled adult rock; meanwhile, any audience UFO might have built up over the harder-edged Schenker years was fleeing to acts like the Scorpions and Judas Priest, who were only getting heavier. To call No Place to Run a middle-of-the-road miscalculation would be generous. The disc had already aged badly when it was released and that hasn't changed in the decades since.