By the end of summer, 1988, I was in wearing the stylish gold jacket of a Century 21 Realtor. Hey, I was 22 and it was time to get serious about life. I was living in Phoenix, since I was still working on my first million, I held on to my night job and continued to perform with Matt, who rented an apartment in nearby Tempe. We played gigs at The Monastery, a neat little old house with a beer and wine license, cats running all over the place, an outdoor stage, no sign, barbeques and a volleyball court tucked away behind a funeral home. I'd also sit in with Matt occasionally on his solo gig at the Duck and DeCanter in central Phoenix, and that September we played a "Concert Under The Stars" event at Encanto Park, where we were billed as "One of the Valley's most talented duos…you will be excited about their contemporary rock sound". How's that for marketing? We were now "contemporary rockers". Did that give us permission to trash motel rooms, wreck cars and act like jerks?

Anyway, one day Matt called me and told me we had hit the jackpot. A five night a week gig at a Holiday Inn in Mesa, AZ. No more booking hassles, steady work, good money (500 bucks a week each) and all we had to do was put up with playing four hours a night of lounge music. We could do that. At least we thought we could. Til we found ourselves being soundly ignored night after night by folks who preferred to watch Johnny Carson on the lounge TV. One time we went three nights in a row with absolutely no reaction from the crowd…no applause, no smiles, not even anybody flipping us off. Believe me, Matt got plenty of mileage out of his "Thank you Mesa!" line. I think the only guy who ever really noticed us was a gay guy from St. Louis who tried to pick up on me when I was playing the grand piano. He had met us on break and invited us to his room after the gig for some "intelligent conversation" and some beers. I, being an idiot, and never known to turn down a cold one, said sure. Matt pulled me aside and told me "Mark, this guy is a screamer- I don't think we want to go up there." I told him B.S, the guy says he's married and has kids. Anyway, after the break and several drinks later, the guy was sitting at the edge of my piano winking at me with a seriously evil grin on his face. I swear I almost barfed! Matt was in the middle of singing some tender love song, trying to control his laughter. We finished the tune and I bailed, straight for the parking lot before this dude could catch up with me. No more Elton John songs for that guy.

We had some interesting experiences, including one with a bottle of Ouzo that had Matt being evicted from the hotel premises during the middle of a song. He was actually carried off the stage while some security guy told me "Just keep playing". While they were shoving a drunken Matt into a taxicab I was back in the lounge, forced to sing lead vocals the rest of the night. I only knew a few songs so I sang them, then hopped over to the piano and did these really weird ten minute long George Winston-type instrumentals to kill all the time I could before the gig mercifully ended. Folks, Ouzo is dangerous stuff…STAY AWAY from it! Finally one day, some new manager walked into the lounge as we were setting up and asked if we were the entertainers. "Yes", we proudly answered. "You're fired", he said. New management wanted somebody with a drum machine. Anyway, Matt fed him a line about how our lawyer would be in touch with him, and how they were obligated to fulfill our contract, etc., etc. The manager got mad, but we ended up playing for 2 more nights, even though the employees were instructed to keep the volume of the lounge stereo or TV on at all times to make us sound bad. The crowd never seemed to notice the difference, though, and after it became apparent that we were so desperate for money that we weren't going anywere, the manager called us into his office and brought out his big weapon: Cash. Sensing rather correctly that we could be bought off easily, he offered us a relatively large sum to get the hell out of Mesa and never come back. Minutes later, Matt and I were outside in the parking lot, counting the dough when I told him, "God, we must suck if they paid us this much to leave.) So much for our steady gig. "Goodbye Mesa!!"

I had a day job to get back to, where I actually was top selling rookie agent in my Century 21 office that year. (The other agents must not have been too impressive…I only made about thirteen grand that year.) But Matt was getting restless, and changes were on the horizon.