Pink Brings High-Flying Spectacle, Emotional Pop Anthems to Globe Life Field

One of the most fascinating things about music is how it can push you out of yourself as easily as it can draw you deep inside, lost in the chambers of your own heart and mind.

That push-pull dynamic often felt as if it were on full display Wednesday night, as Pink finally — after two prior postponements — brought her “Summer Carnival” tour to Arlington's Globe Life Field nearly 18 months after it was first announced. (Still, she’s one up on Neil Young, who just never made it to Texas after multiple reschedulings.)

There was the thrilling abandon of losing yourself in the expansive, riotous spectacle the artist curated over two hours, but also the aching reality of certain lyrics landing far differently the day after the presidential election than they might have just 48 hours prior.

That emotional undercurrent was acknowledged glancingly but was not the sole focus: “Tonight, we’re gonna try to let go, get sweaty, gonna escape — that’s what music’s about, right?” she shouted as “Raise Your Glass” crashed to a close.

The 45-year-old pop superstar was making her first appearance in North Texas in five years, and was weaving this tour stop into her ongoing Trustfall tour, which has kept her on the road off and on for the better part of two years.

What was true a decade ago is no less true now: Pink is one of one in the world of pop music performers. As “Get The Party Started” roared to life before an estimated audience of 65,000 (seemingly filling every available corner of the stadium), Pink began the night strapped into a harness a couple hundred feet above the stage, before ever-so-casually launching herself into thin air, spinning and turning and singing as she made her descent. For all the other special effects deployed with regularity Wednesday across the over-stuffed stage — flames and sparks and smoke and lasers and lights — the most gripping was always Pink. The multi-platinum Grammy winner fearlessly ascends to heights that would give anyone else serious pause, all while deploying her astonishing mezzo-soprano with the greatest of apparent ease. It is riveting.

No less engaging was Sheryl Crow’s roughly hour-long opening set, peppered with one hit after another, ranging from “My Favorite Mistake” and “All I Wanna Do” to “Leaving Las Vegas” and “Every Day Is a Winding Road,” which she prefaced by saying, “It doesn’t matter how you feel about last night — we’re gonna go forward with love, with empathy and take care of each other.”

Even more striking is Pink’s effortless, disarming way of engaging as deeply with fans in the rafters as she does with those at the very front. Demonstrating her range, she sang more delicate material (“Just Give Me a Reason,” “F**kin’ Perfect” or “Please Don’t Leave Me”) with as much force and clarity as she did the berserk, over-the-top anthems “Raise Your Glass,” “Blow Me (One Last Kiss)” or “So What.” It was relentless, and relentlessly entertaining.

With a small army of dancers appearing and disappearing at various intervals, alongside a fully live band — Pink relied on pre-recorded audio only to incorporate Nate Ruess’ vocals in “Just Give Me a Reason” — Pink also puts a premium on human capital, making sure the audience sees the muscle behind the music. It’s a flourish many of her contemporaries often overlook, stuffing the band out of the way, off to the side or forgoing live instrumentation altogether. Seeing the interplay between Pink and her trio of backing vocalists as they sing an acapella intro to “Please Don’t Leave Me” adds depth and potency to all the sensory overload, giving it a more meaningful heft.

Pink’s tenderhearted goofball personality also shone through at multiple points Wednesday, as she made time for banter with her musical director Jason Chapman — the pair’s nightly “stump the singer” game, which found him dusting off “18 Wheeler” from Pink’s 2001 sophomore album (“That’s a deep cut!” she cried) — and welcoming her two children to the stage at various points, while also pausing for a gay couple to get engaged just before she sang “All I Know So Far.”

The sight of one of the men weeping as he raised his fist in the air (an image pointedly captured in close-up on one of the skyscraping video screens beside the stage) felt like a gut punch even as it radiated a kind of anxious joy. The very act had a different tenor on Wednesday night as a country grappled with what’s to come — there were multiple glimpses flashed upon the enormous screens of couples of all sexual persuasions gripping each other tightly Wednesday — and it lingered in the mind as Pink said, just before "I Am Here," “Don’t forget self-care ... never forget self-care. If you need to release some trauma, I invite you to do that now.”

The catharsis of that subsequent roar, echoing off the high steel ceiling of Globe Life Field, will likely stay with me for some time. Escapism can take you only so far. At some point, you have to turn off the record, close the book or leave the concert.

Re-engaging with reality, certainly in the coming days, may require more fortitude than we realize. If we summon the courage of a pink-haired pop star who flies through the air, the unyielding support of those gathered close to us and the raw hope found in lines like “My heart it is racing, but afraid I am not,” just maybe — the music will play on.