A lot of people think live events just magically come together without realizing how much work happens behind the scenes.

This volunteer stage technician works small market events in the Netherlands and constantly deals with performers making last second requests or showing up too late for proper soundchecks. After a while, he stopped arguing and started giving artists exactly what they asked for instead.

One singer decided she wanted a dramatic spotlight during her performance because she thought it would make her look more important on stage.

So the technician climbed up, aimed the spotlight directly at her face, and gave her exactly what she wanted.

She changed her mind pretty quickly after that.

Read on to learn what another artist did to him.

You want a spotlight? here you go!

I’m the volunteer stage technician at small markets here in the Netherlands. It´s great fun! But often, the technician is overlooked by artists. Let´s say sending in music 8 hours prior to the event has become a meme at this point. So, the setup is built to reflect that.

I used to argue with them, but I don’t have time for that. the show must go on! So nowadays, I just maliciously comply.

This time we had a singer. She was like, “You know what would be awesome? A spotlight! That would really make me look important!”

It only took a moment for her to realize it was a bad idea.

“Ok, sure thing..” [grabs pinspot] [climbs in truss] [points at her face]

She yelled, “AAAHH! Geez that’s bright! I can’t see anything! My eyes!!!”

I said, “Uhm, yeah. That’s a spotlight. How else do you think it creates a spot on a dark background? It has to be bright!”

She replied, “Ok, never mind then!”

Clearly, the artist knew nothing about sound setups.

Another one was with an artist who was too late so she missed the soundcheck. I hate that because that means standing with a tablet in the audience and live-mix it in.

With dynamic microphones this isn’t a big deal. They suppress feedback like a charm. But she had a string instrument. If you point a dynamic mic at that, it picks up only a single string. They´re super directional.

So I use a condenser mic. It picks up everything, including the speakers. They’re really hard to fine tune, as they start beeping and echoing pretty fast.

I had it dialed in live just near the edge, and it sounded great in the audience.

He tried to warn them about the feedback.

Then the artist says, “I can’t hear it well enough. Can you turn up the volume?”

I tell the, “Uhm… no. Then it starts feedbacking.”

They yelled, “Just turn it up!”

Sadly, some people have to learn the hard way.

Reluctantly, I said, “Ok.” [whhiieeeeeeeeeeeee]

Immediately I heard, “TURN IT DOWN!!”

“Ok, whatever you say miss!”

And it goes like that every single time! And for some reason the artists love it because I “listen to their wishes,” even if their wishes are not that great.

Yikes! But it’s really not surprising because people like this are everywhere.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about siblings who treat every social outing like a weird competition.

Let’s check out how the folks over at Reddit feel about all this.

Here’s a good thought.

Only some people will understand this.

Here’s someone who can understand his pain.

For this person, the artists are learning lessons.

People really underestimate how much technicians know until something goes wrong.

Most of these performers probably thought the technician just didn’t want to help, when in reality he already knew exactly what would happen if he followed their requests.

But instead of arguing back and forth, he just let them experience the consequences for themselves.

Sometimes people only learn after hearing the feedback squeal or getting blinded by their own spotlight idea.