Behind Pink's "Funhouse" Tour: Backstage With Pop's Edgiest Star

Pink's Funhouse tour touches down in the States in two weeks, which means Americans will get their first look at the singer's high-flying circus spectacle. It's a physically punishing show that has the nearly 30-year-old star spinning from the ceiling to masturbation tune "Fingers," catapulting though the air on a trapeze and, perhaps even more dangerously, covering "Bohemian Rhapsody."

Rolling Stone's Gavin Edwards met up with Pink (born Alecia Moore) during her record-shattering 58-date sold-out Australian arena tour, where she spoke candidly about her breakup (and reconciliation) with Carey Hart, a food fight that ended in a hospital trip, her urge to party ("The demons start talking late at night: 'Come play with us' ") and her enduring role as the country's most unlikely pop star ("I'm the constant underdog in America. It's been this constant fight to prove I have some kind of talent," she says).

Grab our new issue for the full story, and go backstage with Pink on her Funhouse tour, plus check out shots of her show's wild costumes and a look back at her history onstage:
• Behind Pink's "Funhouse" Tour: Backstage With Pop's Edgiest Star
• Pink's High-Flying "Funhouse" Spectacle
• Pink Onstage: A Look Back

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Song Stories

“Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Nirvana | 1991

"Smells Like Teen Spirit," named after a brand of deodorant marketed to girls, was Kurt Cobain's attempt to "write the ultimate pop song," he said, using the soft-loud dynamic of his favorite band, the Pixies. Cobain "had that dichotomy of punk rage and alienation," the song’s producer, Butch Vig, told Rolling Stone, "but also this vulnerable pop sensibility. In 'Teen Spirit,' a lot of that vulnerability is in the tone of his voice." Sadly, by the time of Nirvana's last U.S. tour, in late '93, Cobain was tortured by the obligation to play "Teen Spirit" every night. "There are many other songs that I have written that are as good, if not better," he claimed.

More Song Stories entries »

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