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After the album Alpha, Wetton was forced out of the band in October 1983, on the heels of the comparatively disappointing sales of Alpha. The band stated that Wetton quit and it remains debatable to this day what really happened.(Rumours had it, it was was an alcohol problem). In any event, the next leg of their 1983 US tour (which had begun in the summer but shut down suddenly on September 10 after a performance at Pine Knob in Detroit), scheduled for the fall, was abruptly cancelled, reportedly because of low ticket sales. Ex-King Crimson and ELP front man Greg Lake replaced Wetton for the highly publicised "Asia in Asia" concert at the Nippon Budokan Hall in Tokyo, Japan on Dec. 6, 1983, which was the first concert broadcast over satellite to MTV in the US and later made into a home video. Some of the songs had to be played in a lower key to suit Lake"s voice and he read most of the lyrics from a teleprompter. The Japanese dates were successful financially but not musically. Lake left in early 1984 and Asia reunited with Wetton that same year to start work on their next album. But Steve Howe soon left to be replaced by Krokus guitarist Mandy Meyer. Howe then enjoyed brief success with GTR, another supergroup, formed with Steve Hackett of Genesis and produced by Downes.