Long one, tl;dr at bottom.
I was DJing for a fairly big night club in my city a few years ago. I had started during one of their slower nights, proven I made people show up and get on the floor, and after their main DJ got himself fired for basically having an empty main dance floor and for making threats towards the manager when they asked him to play different types of music to make people dance, I was asked to take over that night. It started off as being a lot of fun, having a “guaranteed” packed club definitely made it rewarding from a creative stand point, the patrons seemed to really enjoy what I was playing and my dance floor was full throughout much of the nights I played.
Having one night a week that was really busy felt like a bit of a waste, so I took it upon myself to try really hard to at least create one other big night a week. I came up with a bunch of concepts, got approval for a couple, made flyers, put up said flyers, advertised on social media, etc etc, all unpaid btw, I did it because I was passionate about it. Some concepts worked better than others, but the point is that I really worked my ass off to try and make another night happen. Meanwhile, the manager, owner, and owners family didn't do a single thing, even though we had discussed it being a team effort to create another busy night. One concept I had was to make a “college game night”, with typical college games in the back, bring in some retro video games, beer pong, etc. The owner's daughter had taken it upon herself to collaborate with a retro video game store of which she claimed she knew the owner. She was going to get some gaming stations from them, and they could advertise their business with us at the same time. Literally the day before the first night she told me she hadn't even talked to them. I had to scramble because all the advertisements said we'd have retro video games for people to play, so to at least not come off as a complete liar I brought in my own WiiU that I downloaded a bunch of retro games on. Not at all what I had had in mind, but at least it was something. The first night was big, a lot of people showed up, but that lasted only that one night since all the games were just so disappointing… well, I tried.
Another thing we did was to throw these foam parties during the summer. It's basically a machine in the ceiling that dumps out a lot of foam/suds on everyone, like a giant foam bath. It was extremely popular, and we liked to have different themes for these parties. Which, always fell on me to come up with, advertise for, and execute. Again, not paid for that, but I did enjoy it, so whatever. I had the idea of doing a Pokemon-themed party, this was during the height of the Pokemon-Go craze and it was the most responded to event we've ever done. Media picked it up, we had local “celebrities” talking about it, etc. This was going to be big. One other guy had offered to go out and get a bunch of pokemon-themed decorations, prizes for a costume contest, and I was going to make some decorations as well. When I get to the club about two hours before opening, there's nothing. No decorations other than what I brought, no prizes, nothing. I was furious, cussed him out a bit. But hey, the show must go on.
One thing I haven't mentioned yet is that the club had had issues with air conditioning for months. It was so bad that sometimes it got over 90 degrees in there. The owner knew this, we'd talked about it extensively, but the fix was always put off. On the night of this Pokemon foam party it was over 100 degrees outside, and well… close to that inside as well. Couple that with a ton of humidity created by the foam, and it was like a sauna inside the club. I had people bring me towels with ice in them that I put on my neck in order to not pass out.
Here comes the part that made me walk out in the middle of this party that I worked really hard to put together. About halfway through the night my DJ equipment completely stopped working due to the humidity. I couldn't do anything, it was not responding. I went to the owner who was at the bar and told him what was going on. The response was “So? What do you want me to do about it?”. I got so pissed that I went back yo the DJ booth, got on the mic (it was hooked up directly to the amp and was still working) and I basically went on a rant about how the owner knew the AC was broken months ago and never fixed it and that it's insane to still be open when it's this hot inside. I then took my stuff and walked out.
I got a call from the manager the next day, she basically apologized for everything that happened, but I was just done with it at that point.
Well, that lasted about six months or so until I was called up by the owner, finally apologizing himself for the whole thing and asked if we could meet face to face to talk. I agreed. The talk went really well, he said all the right things, promised me a few things, one of which was to stop letting a group of people in who constantly caused issues for the club and for me personally (one of them was an aspiring DJ and tried really hard to get my spot, spreading lies, talking shit, etc). Another promise was to make sure I was included in events around the city that the club sponsored (I was their main DJ but there were always someone else DJing, not even from our club, during these events, it just felt weird). With all these promises from the owner I decided to come back.
Things went… ok at first, still some issues that we did address when they came up (such as part of the banned group being in the club, AC still not being fixed, etc). But he was always apologetic and said he'd do better. And he actually did, he put in two new AC units, started to make the place look better overall, took my side during a conflict, etc.
He asked me if I could get some quotes to redo the club's lights, which I agreed to. I bought everything (was compensated for the expense, not my time), put it up, I even got a special tool that hooked up to my computer so that the lights would sync really well to the music. It looked GOOD. I still created specially themed events, of which I always came up with the concept, did the advertising for, and then ran the event while DJing the night of. I barely had any help in that regards, and wasn't compensated for my time. Again, I was ok with it as I did really enjoy it and I felt like I finally had a boss who had my back.
Well… then it became clearer and clearer that he wasn't going to keep the promises about the city events. What he had told me during our talk was that he wouldn't sponsor them unless I got to DJ during them. But when it actually came down to it he did sponsor them and justified it by saying that he'd get lambasted if he pulled out. So it just felt like it was something he said to make me come back, but I digressed. Then I started to notice the “banned” group showing up more and more often, always causing issues, spreading rumors, and just really making me uncomfortable in a variety of ways. The last drop was during a night when the main dude in that group really went out if his way to cause issues, I again told the manager how uncomfortable it made me that he was here when he always caused so many issues, his response was to “get over it”. Again, this was one of the major issues I had brought up when we had the discussion about me coming back. When I replied that I won't get over it, that it's really creating a toxic environment, he flew off the handle, talking about how much he's done for me (uhm… I'm the one who's done a ton of work for you for free, got your place exciting again, and gone out of my way to improve the space)… I just walked out of the club, went home, waited a couple of days to see if he'd apologize and assure me things would change, but nothing. So I sent him a text saying I'm not coming back, removed myself from all the club's social media accounts, and that was it.
I was so exhausted about the situation that I decided to quit DJing altogether. That was maybe four years ago now and I still haven't unpacked my equipment since then. Sad in a way, I did really enjoy the actual DJing part of it, to see people dance and react to what I was doing and had created (I did a lot of remixes and edits of popular songs that i played), and I think I was really good at it, but sometimes you just have to let go and move on. Luckily this was a side gig for me, not a main career path, and after quitting I started to really really focus on my main career. It's really starting to pay off, so it worked out for me anyway, just a shitty way to lose your passion for something…
tl;dr – Walked out while DJing in the middle of one of the club's biggest events because the AC wasn't working and the 95+ degrees inside fried my equipment. Was then basically begged to come back under all these promises, but owner's unwillingness to follow through with said promises finally made me walk out for a second time, and to never DJ again.