On The Record: P!NK - Beautiful Trauma (2017) - full transcript
Making an album is,
you know...
[clock ticking]
[Pink] It's so many moving
pieces. A lot of parts.
[bass drum sounding]
[Pink] The studio sessions,
and you write the songs,
and then...
-I'll say what I want.
-[man] I know you will.
[Pink] You have to finish
the songs, and somebody's
in New York,
and somebody's in Philadelphia
and maybe there's a choir
in Philadelphia and then...
[Pink] And then
it's photo shoots.
The f*** are you looking at?
[Pink] It's video shoots.
Welcome to this first
video shoot.
F****** deal with that.
[Pink] And you're in
dance rehearsals and then
you're maybe on
a festival tour
at the same time over here,
and you're getting ready
for your regular tour.
So, it's rehearsals,
and it's putting on shows,
and then your six-year-old
has surf camp,
your eight-year-old
has a vaccination,
and then your album's out.
[man] Eight-year-old.
-I said eight-year-old?
-[man] Yeah.
Oh, s***.
-[man] So,
"Beautiful Trauma."
-[Pink] Let's do this.
[Pink] Do you have
a wine opener?
Well, I came off
the road in 2013
and I moved away
from civilization
because I was peopled out.
I found a preschool
for my daughter
and I was just kind of
writing and writing
and writing
and doing some other stuff,
and then I made a human.
And then it was time.
It was time.
Oh, God.
Come up a little bit.
[Pink] For a while I didn't
have anything to say
except dumb, sad stuff.
But then I started finding
my voice again.
Make me sound
better than I am
[sound engineer] I'm gonna
turn it down, just so I
don't blast you,
-and then you can turn it up.
-[Pink] I'm deaf. You won't.
[Pink] So then I just started
really going for it.
I need more.
Working with new people,
Johnny being one of them.
Double it.
Busbee, Julia.
Billy, Jack Antonoff,
Greg Kurstin...
Just started going for it
and it started steamrolling.
[drum roll]
Let's giddyap.
Let's do this.
Let's do some verses.
Every time I start a record,
I'm like, I don't know if I
can sing anymore.
I don't know if I have
anything to say.
I don't know if I can
do this anymore.
I probably suck at this now.
And then, 25 songs later,
everyone's like,
"Okay, can you wrap it up?"
And I'm like,
"Oh, I got a lot to say.
That's gonna make
people angry."
[drum roll]
[drums beating]
All right.
[piano playing]
Okay.
[drum beat]
[sound engineer] That's good.
-Good with you?
-No.
[sound engineer] Okay.
Was there another one?
That was the one!
[drum roll]
Sometimes I nail it.
I nailed it.
[Pink] I guess, in some ways,
each record I meet
at least one new threshold
for myself,
and I think
this time it was...
I think vocally, I've never
been in a better place.
On a couple of these records,
I nailed it.
[pop rock playing]
[electronic music playing]
[piano playing]
[audience cheering]
Jack Antonoff is awesome.
He is one of the most
lovable humans in the world.
The first song we did
was "Beautiful Trauma."
And she came up
with that line as a way
to describe
a long-term relationship,
which I loved.
Right away,
you rush to your computer
and find out
if anyone did it already
because it seems
too good to be true.
And it's 5:30. Just FYI.
Oh, my God.
[Pink] The day I get
an actual night's sleep,
like through the night
and then just sleep
until my body decides
to wake up,
I'm gonna be so confused.
[Pink] This.
Forty-five sixteen
is one of my favorites.
Hi, buddy.
It's fun to be awake and then
you come out and everybody's,
"Hi, you."
You smell like a poopy.
My poo poo.
What sparkly skirt?
I'm gonna produce it
for you in two seconds flat.
Would you let
the woman get out
of the f****** bed now.
That was really delightful.
-Step back.
-I'm sorry.
So, this is lovely,
I love that,
but also look at this.
Because you can also
go in the water if you want.
It's a bit more...
I'm gonna get dressed now.
I don't see it as
any sort of like,
Clark Kent-Superman thing.
[Jack] Like, I don't think
there's, like, P!nk
and then Alecia.
[Busbee] It's just like
a version of her persona
is a punched-up version
of her real life.
[Kim] Well,
what do you think?
I think it's great. I'm in it.
I'm not getting out of it.
That's what I think.
[Jack] She's not a mom
and a wife and a friend
and pretends that she's not.
If you're a fan of P!nk,
then you've met parts
of Alecia.
You meet her when you
hear her on the radio.
[Johnny] You meet her
when you see her do
an interview.
But, like all humans,
there is also
so much more to her
than meets the ear or the eye.
How to describe P!nk?
[Johnny] She's warm...
...and passionate.
[Jack] Fun to be around.
Well, she's like
a real human being.
Incredibly intelligent person.
Driven and fierce.
That's such
a trick question
'cause I can see
the edit in my head
of all the different words,
and you know what
the answer is?
She's all of it.
[drum roll]
Yeah. Trying to just get
the voices to all agree.
[Kim] Come on, guys. Today?
You know what it is?
I think I'm PMS-ing, you guys.
I will eat your face.
[Pink] I prefer
for an album to be
a mixed bag of emotions
because that's true.
That's my truth.
Those came from a real place.
It just so happens that I'm
schizophrenic and I have
17 different personalities
all happening at the same time.
I'm the goofiest person
in the world.
I want to laugh.
Really, I want to laugh.
Thanks, bud.
Probably gonna cry,
but I really want to laugh.
[Pink] So those are songs
like "Revenge."
[pop rock music]
[audience cheering]
"Revenge" was a night that
involved a lot of red wine
and laughter,
[Pink] and I went home
and I drank more wine.
We were joking that I
wanted to win a rap Grammy
and so I wrote a rap.
I have a longstanding
love affair with
Marshall Mathers.
It started in 2001 when I
asked him for his autograph
at the MTV Awards.
He's just, he's a genius
and I wrote him
this long email,
and I was like,
"Look, I love you.
I've always loved you.
You know
I've always loved you.
And you should totally be
on my record again."
And he just
wrote back, "Okay."
I was like, "Great."
And then four days later,
from Rio de Janeiro,
the best thing I've
ever heard in my life.
And then I emailed him again.
I was like, "Oh, my God,
it's amazing. Thank you.
I love you. I want to
tackle you and shove
your face in the dirt
and kiss you on the cheek
and I can't wait
to thank you in person."
"Okay."
"You're a horse, you're
a horse. This is war."
That's what I told him.
I'm like, "He loves horses.
He rides a lot
of them in Detroit."
[audience cheering]
[Pink] I think that's
what alchemy is.
Okay, so...
[drum beats]
That's not the right key.
Okay.
[drum beats]
No, that one's all right.
That one's like...
Yeah, but I mean it.
I need way more piano please.
There we go.
[piano playing]
Oh, is it on Sunday?
That's gonna be amazing
[audience cheering]
[piano playing]
Just one note.
Busbee was like,
"We need one note,
piano. One note."
[Pink] And I was like,
"Okay, let's do that."
[Busbee] I just sat down
at the piano and started
playing some chords,
and she started reading me--
She had a bound book
of, you know, papers
with all of these
verses written,
and in one of those verses
she said the line,
"Wild hearts can't be broken."
And I was like, "What's that?"
[Pink] Well, Busbee and I
started writing that song for
a movie called Suffragette.
The movie is about
the Suffragette movement
which is women's right to vote.
You have to fight
for what's rightly yours,
which is rights and respect
and love and kindness
and compassion and...
and you have to be
willing to die for it.
These women were.
[audience cheering]
[audience cheering]
Okay.
Thank you, guys.
Wow, that was...
I didn't think that
was gonna happen.
[man] Yes. Thank you.
[intense music]
[Pink] I think vulnerability
is important to me
because it's so difficult,
because it's so uncomfortable.
I think the human experience
shouldn't be covered up.
I think it should be
lived out loud.
[Johnny] Alecia
is quite fearless.
It was inspiring
to work with someone
who would risk saying
the things that she says
the way she says them.
That's truly an artist.
[Pink] Welcome
to my first video
from my new album.
I'm P!nk.
Nailed it.
What does it mean when
everybody's saying,
"I love you, Mom"?
Why do people say that?
What does that mean?
[man] 'Cause you're a mom.
It's like a gay thing.
Gays, they have, like,
their pop queens
and they refer to them
as, like, Mom.
-Well, thank you for...
-[man] Enlightening you.
Enlightening me on what's
going on with the kids
these days.
All right, let's do this.
"What About Us?"
[all cheering]
-[Georgia] There's the man.
There he is.
-[Pink] What man?
[Pink] Good? Everyone good?
Let's rock it!
[Pink] I think empathy...
is a human necessity.
[drum roll]
I allow myself
and others around me.
I can hold space
for flaws or faults
or pain and true experiences.
I see in other people
what's the truth
that's happening
and I want them to feel
comfortable being that.
I want to be like,
"Look, I'm doing it, too.
I feel like an idiot.
I'm scared half the time."
It's hot as donkey b****.
Donkey b**** are hot
I should have been asleep
four hours ago
[Pink] You can write
55 mediocre songs
that you like,
and then there's that one day
that you had no idea
that was gonna happen.
And "What About Us?" was
one of those days.
[intense music]
There's an inherent humanness
about vulnerability.
We're all vulnerable.
[Johnny] We all work out
how to hide it and defend
ourselves against it,
but if you're an artist
then you go into that place
where you're willing
to walk into the fire
of being vulnerable.
You put that on a record
and put that out to the world,
and I think people,
their hearts automatically
beat in time with it.
I mean, I think
"What About Us?" took us
maybe 15 minutes to write
and 10 minutes to record.
Those are those kinds
of songs where it just
falls out of you.
That's why I think
you're just a vessel
[Pink] when you're
being creative.
Alecia really does point
at a star and she goes for it.
[Johnny] It may be blurred
and in the distance
for a moment,
but she still walks
towards it.
As she does that,
then the song is revealed.
Like, it comes to fruition
in the room.
[pop rock music playing]
[piano playing]
[audience clapping
and cheering]
Thank you.
[Pink] Honestly, I think
it starts with sitting
on the floor.
You have to get
people from out behind
their computers
and you have to sit
on the floor.
[Billy Mann] She can
be really direct and simple,
and it's not trite.
It's honorable and it's
got integrity, and there
are moments
where she has
come up with lyrics
when I've been, like,
"I don't think we can
say that." And she's like,
"Oh, we can say it."
[Pink] You can bring all
of your luggage to the studio
and then you just
slowly start to unpack it.
She will run...
and have an allergic reaction
to something that's contrived.
[Pink] I don't have words
I want to put in a song.
I don't have
a preexisting notion.
I just think the more idiotic
you can be and the more free,
and the more unafraid,
where there truly is
no shame and no bad idea,
I think that's when
you'll stumble on something.
[drum beats]
You have to dare to suck,
and I think where people
get hung up a lot of the time
is they think their idea
is dumb and they don't say it.
But I say the worst stuff,
I get that out
of the way first.
So I've been working with Max
and Johan for a long time.
I don't know.
We can get pretty serious.
"Whatever You Want"
was just basically,
"What do you want
to write about?
"Carey."
We have felt like
our ship is going down
so many times in a really,
real way and sometimes
we have crashed
and we have split.
[Pink] But we
always come back.
I think that true love
is always coming back
to the table,
and "Whatever You Want"
is sort of about that.
It's at the end of the day
like, whatever you want.
[audience cheering]
Thank you. Thanks.
Thank you.
Kind of do a little bit
of cuff action... I love it.
I'm a very unique-looking
person, aren't I?
Strong, strong face.
[Kim Bowen] We need
to pin it at the back,
so could you help me
with a bit of safety pinnage?
Interesting to be me.
Trust me.
Here, baby.
[camera man] I try not
to imagine, to be honest
with you.
Venice.
[Pink] All right. Hey, hi.
It's so funny to be
doing this here
because I've never done
anything like this.
My dream was to get
legally emancipated,
drop out of school,
and hitchhike across country
to get discovered
on Venice Beach.
That was my dream
since I was eight years old.
[Pink] When I decided
that all grown-ups
were full of it
and school was not
a place for me,
and my parents were fighting,
and all of these things
were going on,
And everyone was pretending.
Everything's okay, pretending,
and then you hear
that voice of the person
that's not pretending
and they're there for you
and you understand them
and they speak your language,
so that's what music is to me.
And then I got kicked out
of my mom's house,
dropped out of school,
got a record deal, and...
[Billy] How old were you
when you--
[Pink] Completed
the dream. Sixteen.
Then I moved out here
when I was 19.
Her fans count on her
to give more depth
[Billy Mann] than they
would get from an artist
that doesn't have
that deeper life, yet.
That isn't in a committed
relationship,
that doesn't deal with
balancing work and motherhood.
Is that's what's happening?
I'm gonna go get my kid
from surf camp.
[Willow] Why are you
going in my playroom?
[Pink] So cool, right, Wills?
I did that this morning
when you went to camp.
[Willow] Where was that?
[Pink] At the bar down
the street with the sawdust
on the floor.
That's awesome.
She's such
a magical little elf.
She doesn't want
to put clothes on.
She wants to run around,
climb trees, do handstands.
You can't keep her attention
for longer than 13 seconds.
It's just, it's awesome.
It's such a reminder
of how we start out,
just free.
I cried her first day
of preschool and she
was gone.
She was like, "Later."
Like, "If you're worried,
if you're worried,
I'll be right here."
Hi, buddy.
It feels good.
Look, your sissy is up here,
too. The whole fam-bam.
Bring me your butt
[Pink] I would like to put
everything I am
and everything I have
into everything that I do.
I'd say the hardest part
is just trying to figure
it all out and balance it all.
You know, I signed up
for this when I was 16
and now I have children
[Pink] and I have a marriage
and I have, you know,
I have stuff,
and I just want to always
make sure that I'm doing
right by them.
I need everybody to be good.
So, it's not
a simple puzzle anymore,
it's not just me.
What do you think?
What do you think, Wills?
You like all this fuss?
It's so sweet because
they're so sweet.
They don't have
all the stuff that we have.
Man, it'd be nice to go back
there for a second, when
the world was simpler.
[guitar music playing]
[guitar music playing]
I grew up a P!nk fan.
When I met P!nk,
I was so nervous,
because I was like,
"Please don't be mean.
Please be awesome.
Please be as awesome
as I think you are."
I love Julia.
She's so talented.
That song makes
my heart hurt.
I mean, it's beautiful.
The melody, the sentiment.
When we were writing
"Barbie," we were talking
about our pasts
and how we grew up,
and, you know,
everything is so...
high-tech, nowadays,
And it wasn't when you
were a kid.
I'm turning 38 in a couple
of days and I still feel like
a 17-year-old boy,
or like an eight-year-old
girl at times,
and it's really hard for me
to believe that I'm a grown-up
and that I'm supposed
to be responsible
for my kids now.
And I am, I'm gone
way too far responsible.
But I think we all feel
like that when the pressures
mounting up
and we have these
responsibilities and
the weight of the world,
it feels like, is on your
shoulders and you just want
to go back
to playing in your room.
[audience cheering]
We caught a vibe. I remember
being in the studio
and we had like a kick drum
that was just simple...
you know.
[kick drum beats]
And I started playing
the finger-picking thing
on the acoustic guitar,
and there was this
really cool... over it.
And when we were doing it,
there was a part in the song
where the harmonies
came in that felt
very gospelly
and she was immediately like,
"We gotta go back to Philly
and, you know,
why don't we do this
with a gospel choir?"
[Flynn] It's very sentimental
for me to come back
to Philadelphia
as it's very sentimental
for Alecia because we grew up
very much disenfranchised kids
growing up in the city.
There are optional paths
for us,
and some of those paths
are really bad,
and the good ones
are sometimes harder to find.
But singing in church
was one for me,
and it was one for her.
And she's about as
down-to-earth a superstar
as you're ever gonna meet.
I thank you in advance,
and now I'm gonna do
something great,
which is we're gonna take
the spirit of what we are
all about
and we're gonna put it
on tape, and that is
going to reach
hundreds of millions
of people with somebody
who has the integrity
to go out and be themselves.
[upbeat music playing]
Hi.
[Pink] How are you?
Hi, y'all.
Thank you so much.
I can't wait to hear it.
This is Willow.
[All] Hi, Willow.
Hi. She's got perfect pitch.
Just gonna put that out there.
[Pink] This is a dream
come true for me.
I used to sing
in a church in North Philly
back in the day.
How do you feel?
Do you feel like you
want to sing anymore?
Absolutely. I like singing.
[Flynn] Lyrically, it's
very much about
her journey as a person.
[Pink] I think
the most rewarding part...
of all of this is...
is the work.
[Pink] I've gotten
to a place in my life where
I'm kind of proud of myself
because I'm a hard worker
and I don't give up.
[Pink] I'm proud
of the team that's around me.
It's my family and I feel like,
like I've been traveling
as a gypsy for so long and...
now I'm home.
[upbeat music playing]
Oh, no.
-Oh, no.
-What's wrong?
They're still awake
waiting for me.
-Oh, you're going home?
-No. "Put them to bed.
They need sleep."
[man] If you go now,
you'll be home
in 20 minutes, right?
Okay. Willow's gonna
wait up for me.
[man] You know
what we're doing, right?
[woman clapping]
[choir singing]
[piano playing]
[music fades]
you know...
[clock ticking]
[Pink] It's so many moving
pieces. A lot of parts.
[bass drum sounding]
[Pink] The studio sessions,
and you write the songs,
and then...
-I'll say what I want.
-[man] I know you will.
[Pink] You have to finish
the songs, and somebody's
in New York,
and somebody's in Philadelphia
and maybe there's a choir
in Philadelphia and then...
[Pink] And then
it's photo shoots.
The f*** are you looking at?
[Pink] It's video shoots.
Welcome to this first
video shoot.
F****** deal with that.
[Pink] And you're in
dance rehearsals and then
you're maybe on
a festival tour
at the same time over here,
and you're getting ready
for your regular tour.
So, it's rehearsals,
and it's putting on shows,
and then your six-year-old
has surf camp,
your eight-year-old
has a vaccination,
and then your album's out.
[man] Eight-year-old.
-I said eight-year-old?
-[man] Yeah.
Oh, s***.
-[man] So,
"Beautiful Trauma."
-[Pink] Let's do this.
[Pink] Do you have
a wine opener?
Well, I came off
the road in 2013
and I moved away
from civilization
because I was peopled out.
I found a preschool
for my daughter
and I was just kind of
writing and writing
and writing
and doing some other stuff,
and then I made a human.
And then it was time.
It was time.
Oh, God.
Come up a little bit.
[Pink] For a while I didn't
have anything to say
except dumb, sad stuff.
But then I started finding
my voice again.
Make me sound
better than I am
[sound engineer] I'm gonna
turn it down, just so I
don't blast you,
-and then you can turn it up.
-[Pink] I'm deaf. You won't.
[Pink] So then I just started
really going for it.
I need more.
Working with new people,
Johnny being one of them.
Double it.
Busbee, Julia.
Billy, Jack Antonoff,
Greg Kurstin...
Just started going for it
and it started steamrolling.
[drum roll]
Let's giddyap.
Let's do this.
Let's do some verses.
Every time I start a record,
I'm like, I don't know if I
can sing anymore.
I don't know if I have
anything to say.
I don't know if I can
do this anymore.
I probably suck at this now.
And then, 25 songs later,
everyone's like,
"Okay, can you wrap it up?"
And I'm like,
"Oh, I got a lot to say.
That's gonna make
people angry."
[drum roll]
[drums beating]
All right.
[piano playing]
Okay.
[drum beat]
[sound engineer] That's good.
-Good with you?
-No.
[sound engineer] Okay.
Was there another one?
That was the one!
[drum roll]
Sometimes I nail it.
I nailed it.
[Pink] I guess, in some ways,
each record I meet
at least one new threshold
for myself,
and I think
this time it was...
I think vocally, I've never
been in a better place.
On a couple of these records,
I nailed it.
[pop rock playing]
[electronic music playing]
[piano playing]
[audience cheering]
Jack Antonoff is awesome.
He is one of the most
lovable humans in the world.
The first song we did
was "Beautiful Trauma."
And she came up
with that line as a way
to describe
a long-term relationship,
which I loved.
Right away,
you rush to your computer
and find out
if anyone did it already
because it seems
too good to be true.
And it's 5:30. Just FYI.
Oh, my God.
[Pink] The day I get
an actual night's sleep,
like through the night
and then just sleep
until my body decides
to wake up,
I'm gonna be so confused.
[Pink] This.
Forty-five sixteen
is one of my favorites.
Hi, buddy.
It's fun to be awake and then
you come out and everybody's,
"Hi, you."
You smell like a poopy.
My poo poo.
What sparkly skirt?
I'm gonna produce it
for you in two seconds flat.
Would you let
the woman get out
of the f****** bed now.
That was really delightful.
-Step back.
-I'm sorry.
So, this is lovely,
I love that,
but also look at this.
Because you can also
go in the water if you want.
It's a bit more...
I'm gonna get dressed now.
I don't see it as
any sort of like,
Clark Kent-Superman thing.
[Jack] Like, I don't think
there's, like, P!nk
and then Alecia.
[Busbee] It's just like
a version of her persona
is a punched-up version
of her real life.
[Kim] Well,
what do you think?
I think it's great. I'm in it.
I'm not getting out of it.
That's what I think.
[Jack] She's not a mom
and a wife and a friend
and pretends that she's not.
If you're a fan of P!nk,
then you've met parts
of Alecia.
You meet her when you
hear her on the radio.
[Johnny] You meet her
when you see her do
an interview.
But, like all humans,
there is also
so much more to her
than meets the ear or the eye.
How to describe P!nk?
[Johnny] She's warm...
...and passionate.
[Jack] Fun to be around.
Well, she's like
a real human being.
Incredibly intelligent person.
Driven and fierce.
That's such
a trick question
'cause I can see
the edit in my head
of all the different words,
and you know what
the answer is?
She's all of it.
[drum roll]
Yeah. Trying to just get
the voices to all agree.
[Kim] Come on, guys. Today?
You know what it is?
I think I'm PMS-ing, you guys.
I will eat your face.
[Pink] I prefer
for an album to be
a mixed bag of emotions
because that's true.
That's my truth.
Those came from a real place.
It just so happens that I'm
schizophrenic and I have
17 different personalities
all happening at the same time.
I'm the goofiest person
in the world.
I want to laugh.
Really, I want to laugh.
Thanks, bud.
Probably gonna cry,
but I really want to laugh.
[Pink] So those are songs
like "Revenge."
[pop rock music]
[audience cheering]
"Revenge" was a night that
involved a lot of red wine
and laughter,
[Pink] and I went home
and I drank more wine.
We were joking that I
wanted to win a rap Grammy
and so I wrote a rap.
I have a longstanding
love affair with
Marshall Mathers.
It started in 2001 when I
asked him for his autograph
at the MTV Awards.
He's just, he's a genius
and I wrote him
this long email,
and I was like,
"Look, I love you.
I've always loved you.
You know
I've always loved you.
And you should totally be
on my record again."
And he just
wrote back, "Okay."
I was like, "Great."
And then four days later,
from Rio de Janeiro,
the best thing I've
ever heard in my life.
And then I emailed him again.
I was like, "Oh, my God,
it's amazing. Thank you.
I love you. I want to
tackle you and shove
your face in the dirt
and kiss you on the cheek
and I can't wait
to thank you in person."
"Okay."
"You're a horse, you're
a horse. This is war."
That's what I told him.
I'm like, "He loves horses.
He rides a lot
of them in Detroit."
[audience cheering]
[Pink] I think that's
what alchemy is.
Okay, so...
[drum beats]
That's not the right key.
Okay.
[drum beats]
No, that one's all right.
That one's like...
Yeah, but I mean it.
I need way more piano please.
There we go.
[piano playing]
Oh, is it on Sunday?
That's gonna be amazing
[audience cheering]
[piano playing]
Just one note.
Busbee was like,
"We need one note,
piano. One note."
[Pink] And I was like,
"Okay, let's do that."
[Busbee] I just sat down
at the piano and started
playing some chords,
and she started reading me--
She had a bound book
of, you know, papers
with all of these
verses written,
and in one of those verses
she said the line,
"Wild hearts can't be broken."
And I was like, "What's that?"
[Pink] Well, Busbee and I
started writing that song for
a movie called Suffragette.
The movie is about
the Suffragette movement
which is women's right to vote.
You have to fight
for what's rightly yours,
which is rights and respect
and love and kindness
and compassion and...
and you have to be
willing to die for it.
These women were.
[audience cheering]
[audience cheering]
Okay.
Thank you, guys.
Wow, that was...
I didn't think that
was gonna happen.
[man] Yes. Thank you.
[intense music]
[Pink] I think vulnerability
is important to me
because it's so difficult,
because it's so uncomfortable.
I think the human experience
shouldn't be covered up.
I think it should be
lived out loud.
[Johnny] Alecia
is quite fearless.
It was inspiring
to work with someone
who would risk saying
the things that she says
the way she says them.
That's truly an artist.
[Pink] Welcome
to my first video
from my new album.
I'm P!nk.
Nailed it.
What does it mean when
everybody's saying,
"I love you, Mom"?
Why do people say that?
What does that mean?
[man] 'Cause you're a mom.
It's like a gay thing.
Gays, they have, like,
their pop queens
and they refer to them
as, like, Mom.
-Well, thank you for...
-[man] Enlightening you.
Enlightening me on what's
going on with the kids
these days.
All right, let's do this.
"What About Us?"
[all cheering]
-[Georgia] There's the man.
There he is.
-[Pink] What man?
[Pink] Good? Everyone good?
Let's rock it!
[Pink] I think empathy...
is a human necessity.
[drum roll]
I allow myself
and others around me.
I can hold space
for flaws or faults
or pain and true experiences.
I see in other people
what's the truth
that's happening
and I want them to feel
comfortable being that.
I want to be like,
"Look, I'm doing it, too.
I feel like an idiot.
I'm scared half the time."
It's hot as donkey b****.
Donkey b**** are hot
I should have been asleep
four hours ago
[Pink] You can write
55 mediocre songs
that you like,
and then there's that one day
that you had no idea
that was gonna happen.
And "What About Us?" was
one of those days.
[intense music]
There's an inherent humanness
about vulnerability.
We're all vulnerable.
[Johnny] We all work out
how to hide it and defend
ourselves against it,
but if you're an artist
then you go into that place
where you're willing
to walk into the fire
of being vulnerable.
You put that on a record
and put that out to the world,
and I think people,
their hearts automatically
beat in time with it.
I mean, I think
"What About Us?" took us
maybe 15 minutes to write
and 10 minutes to record.
Those are those kinds
of songs where it just
falls out of you.
That's why I think
you're just a vessel
[Pink] when you're
being creative.
Alecia really does point
at a star and she goes for it.
[Johnny] It may be blurred
and in the distance
for a moment,
but she still walks
towards it.
As she does that,
then the song is revealed.
Like, it comes to fruition
in the room.
[pop rock music playing]
[piano playing]
[audience clapping
and cheering]
Thank you.
[Pink] Honestly, I think
it starts with sitting
on the floor.
You have to get
people from out behind
their computers
and you have to sit
on the floor.
[Billy Mann] She can
be really direct and simple,
and it's not trite.
It's honorable and it's
got integrity, and there
are moments
where she has
come up with lyrics
when I've been, like,
"I don't think we can
say that." And she's like,
"Oh, we can say it."
[Pink] You can bring all
of your luggage to the studio
and then you just
slowly start to unpack it.
She will run...
and have an allergic reaction
to something that's contrived.
[Pink] I don't have words
I want to put in a song.
I don't have
a preexisting notion.
I just think the more idiotic
you can be and the more free,
and the more unafraid,
where there truly is
no shame and no bad idea,
I think that's when
you'll stumble on something.
[drum beats]
You have to dare to suck,
and I think where people
get hung up a lot of the time
is they think their idea
is dumb and they don't say it.
But I say the worst stuff,
I get that out
of the way first.
So I've been working with Max
and Johan for a long time.
I don't know.
We can get pretty serious.
"Whatever You Want"
was just basically,
"What do you want
to write about?
"Carey."
We have felt like
our ship is going down
so many times in a really,
real way and sometimes
we have crashed
and we have split.
[Pink] But we
always come back.
I think that true love
is always coming back
to the table,
and "Whatever You Want"
is sort of about that.
It's at the end of the day
like, whatever you want.
[audience cheering]
Thank you. Thanks.
Thank you.
Kind of do a little bit
of cuff action... I love it.
I'm a very unique-looking
person, aren't I?
Strong, strong face.
[Kim Bowen] We need
to pin it at the back,
so could you help me
with a bit of safety pinnage?
Interesting to be me.
Trust me.
Here, baby.
[camera man] I try not
to imagine, to be honest
with you.
Venice.
[Pink] All right. Hey, hi.
It's so funny to be
doing this here
because I've never done
anything like this.
My dream was to get
legally emancipated,
drop out of school,
and hitchhike across country
to get discovered
on Venice Beach.
That was my dream
since I was eight years old.
[Pink] When I decided
that all grown-ups
were full of it
and school was not
a place for me,
and my parents were fighting,
and all of these things
were going on,
And everyone was pretending.
Everything's okay, pretending,
and then you hear
that voice of the person
that's not pretending
and they're there for you
and you understand them
and they speak your language,
so that's what music is to me.
And then I got kicked out
of my mom's house,
dropped out of school,
got a record deal, and...
[Billy] How old were you
when you--
[Pink] Completed
the dream. Sixteen.
Then I moved out here
when I was 19.
Her fans count on her
to give more depth
[Billy Mann] than they
would get from an artist
that doesn't have
that deeper life, yet.
That isn't in a committed
relationship,
that doesn't deal with
balancing work and motherhood.
Is that's what's happening?
I'm gonna go get my kid
from surf camp.
[Willow] Why are you
going in my playroom?
[Pink] So cool, right, Wills?
I did that this morning
when you went to camp.
[Willow] Where was that?
[Pink] At the bar down
the street with the sawdust
on the floor.
That's awesome.
She's such
a magical little elf.
She doesn't want
to put clothes on.
She wants to run around,
climb trees, do handstands.
You can't keep her attention
for longer than 13 seconds.
It's just, it's awesome.
It's such a reminder
of how we start out,
just free.
I cried her first day
of preschool and she
was gone.
She was like, "Later."
Like, "If you're worried,
if you're worried,
I'll be right here."
Hi, buddy.
It feels good.
Look, your sissy is up here,
too. The whole fam-bam.
Bring me your butt
[Pink] I would like to put
everything I am
and everything I have
into everything that I do.
I'd say the hardest part
is just trying to figure
it all out and balance it all.
You know, I signed up
for this when I was 16
and now I have children
[Pink] and I have a marriage
and I have, you know,
I have stuff,
and I just want to always
make sure that I'm doing
right by them.
I need everybody to be good.
So, it's not
a simple puzzle anymore,
it's not just me.
What do you think?
What do you think, Wills?
You like all this fuss?
It's so sweet because
they're so sweet.
They don't have
all the stuff that we have.
Man, it'd be nice to go back
there for a second, when
the world was simpler.
[guitar music playing]
[guitar music playing]
I grew up a P!nk fan.
When I met P!nk,
I was so nervous,
because I was like,
"Please don't be mean.
Please be awesome.
Please be as awesome
as I think you are."
I love Julia.
She's so talented.
That song makes
my heart hurt.
I mean, it's beautiful.
The melody, the sentiment.
When we were writing
"Barbie," we were talking
about our pasts
and how we grew up,
and, you know,
everything is so...
high-tech, nowadays,
And it wasn't when you
were a kid.
I'm turning 38 in a couple
of days and I still feel like
a 17-year-old boy,
or like an eight-year-old
girl at times,
and it's really hard for me
to believe that I'm a grown-up
and that I'm supposed
to be responsible
for my kids now.
And I am, I'm gone
way too far responsible.
But I think we all feel
like that when the pressures
mounting up
and we have these
responsibilities and
the weight of the world,
it feels like, is on your
shoulders and you just want
to go back
to playing in your room.
[audience cheering]
We caught a vibe. I remember
being in the studio
and we had like a kick drum
that was just simple...
you know.
[kick drum beats]
And I started playing
the finger-picking thing
on the acoustic guitar,
and there was this
really cool... over it.
And when we were doing it,
there was a part in the song
where the harmonies
came in that felt
very gospelly
and she was immediately like,
"We gotta go back to Philly
and, you know,
why don't we do this
with a gospel choir?"
[Flynn] It's very sentimental
for me to come back
to Philadelphia
as it's very sentimental
for Alecia because we grew up
very much disenfranchised kids
growing up in the city.
There are optional paths
for us,
and some of those paths
are really bad,
and the good ones
are sometimes harder to find.
But singing in church
was one for me,
and it was one for her.
And she's about as
down-to-earth a superstar
as you're ever gonna meet.
I thank you in advance,
and now I'm gonna do
something great,
which is we're gonna take
the spirit of what we are
all about
and we're gonna put it
on tape, and that is
going to reach
hundreds of millions
of people with somebody
who has the integrity
to go out and be themselves.
[upbeat music playing]
Hi.
[Pink] How are you?
Hi, y'all.
Thank you so much.
I can't wait to hear it.
This is Willow.
[All] Hi, Willow.
Hi. She's got perfect pitch.
Just gonna put that out there.
[Pink] This is a dream
come true for me.
I used to sing
in a church in North Philly
back in the day.
How do you feel?
Do you feel like you
want to sing anymore?
Absolutely. I like singing.
[Flynn] Lyrically, it's
very much about
her journey as a person.
[Pink] I think
the most rewarding part...
of all of this is...
is the work.
[Pink] I've gotten
to a place in my life where
I'm kind of proud of myself
because I'm a hard worker
and I don't give up.
[Pink] I'm proud
of the team that's around me.
It's my family and I feel like,
like I've been traveling
as a gypsy for so long and...
now I'm home.
[upbeat music playing]
Oh, no.
-Oh, no.
-What's wrong?
They're still awake
waiting for me.
-Oh, you're going home?
-No. "Put them to bed.
They need sleep."
[man] If you go now,
you'll be home
in 20 minutes, right?
Okay. Willow's gonna
wait up for me.
[man] You know
what we're doing, right?
[woman clapping]
[choir singing]
[piano playing]
[music fades]