Pink, real name Alecia Beth Moore, endured a troubled upbringing and a near-death experience
that shook her to the core.
But she realigned her priorities and set out to become the superstar she is today.
Join us as we relive the singer's incredible career and stunning transformation.
"I put my head down, and I just do what I do, and what I do is really cool and fun.
It's fun!"
Pink's parents got divorced when she was just a kid, after years of acrimony took its toll
on their marriage.
Pink went on to write about her parents splitting up in the heartbreaking song, "Family Portrait".
While the track resonated with many of her fans, Pink originally regretted releasing
it.
She told Entertainment Weekly,
"I was like, 'I should not have done this.'
And I took it home to my mom and she cried for four days.
It was s--- we never talked about.
And my mom was like, 'I didn’t know that the divorce affected you that deeply.'
And I'm like, 'It didn’t.
I don't think it did.
I just needed to write that song.'"
Pink had a hard time with the relationships in her life, and the singer's connection with
her mother was strained from a very early age.
She told Redbook,
"I didn't get along with my mom, who was the sole parent at the time.
I just wanted to move out, and I was like 10."
Things weren't exactly easy with her father either, as Pink told the Independent,
"He was an abused child, he went to Catholic school, then he volunteered for Vietnam to
get away from it...Full-contact karate.
Guerrilla warfare.
He's insane.
I grew up with rocket-launchers in my garage."
Eventually Pink's father started a support group for veterans and worked with them to
raise money for the vulnerable in their community.
Pink recalls hearing them talk about their experiences together, which made quite the
impact on her.
By the time that Pink hit her early teens, she had a pretty bad reputation in her neighborhood,
as she told The Guardian,
"Other people's parents wouldn't let me come over when I was a kid...No one wanted their
kid anywhere near me."
Pink didn't just have difficulties at home, but was seemingly always in trouble wherever
she went.
She explained to Redbook,
"My teachers hated me because I was curious...[but] I was also confrontational.
I had a chip on my shoulder."
All of this came to a head when, at 15 years old, Pink's mother kicked her out of the house.
Part of the reason that Pink had such a bad reputation was because she was using all kinds
of drugs.
She told the Sunday World,
"I wasn't interested in school, sports, hobbies or any of the other supposedly healthy things
kids should be into.
I just wanted to get high.
I was running wild and heading for a fall."
That fall happened on Thanksgiving in 1995 when Pink overdosed on a combination of drugs
and alcohol inside of a club in Philadelphia.
Fortunately, Pink survived to tell the tale, and she told the Independent,
"Then I was clean...at 15."
After her near-death experience, Pink immediately got sober and focused on cleaning up her life.
It would seem that she was ready and willing to leave her party days behind her, instead
focusing on what would become her destiny.
Filled with clear-headed determination, a newly-sober Pink didn't waste any time pursuing
her new goal of getting a record contract.
After a brief stint in a girl group, Pink signed her first solo record contract in 1996,
before peers like Britney Spears, Jessica Simpson, Christina Aguilera, and Mandy Moore.
Pink insisted on being original, and came up with her own name, image, style, and lyrics,
which was something that the record executives at LaFace Records struggled with.
In an interview with Launch, Pink explained,
"They were like, 'Well, what's this girl like?
She's punk rocker-thug type.
Like, what is she?'"
However, Pink wasn't worried about the mixed reaction, as she told Launch,
"If it makes you feel better, put me in that category, but I'm painting the world pink,
so it's whatever."
Pink dropped her first album, Can't Take Me Home, in 2000.
The record sold two million copies and had several songs in the Billboard Hot 100.
That success was partly due to LaFace Records president L.A. Reid and producers like Daryl
Simmons and Babyface, who had a heavy hand in shaping the R&B album.
However, Pink never felt as though the album was truly authentic and from her heart, as
she revealed in an interview with Derek Paiva,
"With Can't Take Me Home, I wasn't really in full control.
It was really left up to the producers and my record company."
Pink also said that, while recording the album, she had a bad attitude and was in an unhappy
relationship, both of which were reflected in the music.
Rather than relinquish some of the control she had over her album, Pink went rogue when
recording her second album, M!ssundaztood.
She told Advocate,
"M!ssundaztood was the point in my life where I decided it was my life...I was going to
go balls to the wall, and I think honestly...music has to do with timing.
I think M!ssundaztood, for a lot of us, [came out at] a time in our life when we were just
really getting to know ourselves."
Pink tapped 4 Non Blonds front-woman Linda Perry to write the album, which was a deeply
personal exploration of Pink's emotional life.
The record included songs that made both her mother and her father cry, as she recounted
some of the most painful moments from her youth.
Fortunately, when M!ssundaztood was released, it was so successful that it reshaped the
pop landscape.
She explained to Variety,
"But before it came out, I was being told that it's going to completely fail...Then
it comes out and sells 15 million records."
Understandably, Pink was over the moon, and officially a pop superstar.
What do you get when you take Pink, Lil' Kim, Christina Aguilera, and Mya, and put them
together in a pop collaboration produced by Missy Elliott?
Why "Lady Marmalade", of course.
The song, which was originally performed by Patti LaBelle, was re-imagined for the Moulin
Rouge! soundtrack.
Pink confessed at the time,
"I think everyone was pretty nervous about getting the four of us together.
But we proved them wrong; we get along."
The song was a huge hit, despite rumblings that Pink and Aguilera were at each other's
throats during production.
The track even snagged the Grammy Award for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals in 2002,
which was Pink's first-ever Grammy.
In 2017, Pink confirmed in a tweet that she and Aguilera had since put their beef behind
them.
Pink might be an underrated LGBTQ+ icon, thanks to her authentic style, lyrics that marginalized
people can relate to, and her genuine commitment to being a solid ally.
But as for whether the singer herself is a member of the LGBTQ+ community, Pink told
Advocate,
"Honestly, I've never defined myself...I've never felt the need to.
I still don't.
It's just like how everyone's like, 'Well, what kind of music do you do?'
And I'm like, 'I don't.
I just do it.'...I'm a mystery bag."
Pink has been with motocross racer Carey Hart for a really long time.
The pair met in 2001, got married in 2006, and have two children together, Willow and
Jameson.
However, in 2008 it seemed like the couple might not make it, as they broke up for nearly
a year.
Of the split, Pink told Redbook,
"Because we were working all the time; there was so much time between our visits.
Carey would see me for five days and be gone for six weeks.
We'd try to fix everything in those five days, you just can't do that.
And it builds and builds and you don't even know what to say or fight about anymore."
Pink and Hart reconciled nearly a year after splitting up, after Hart invited the singer
to perform at his club in Las Vegas on New Year's Eve.
That's when he told her he wanted to get back together, and Pink happily agreed.
After that, the couple started their family, and they haven't looked back.
In 2011, three years after reconciling, Pink and Hart welcomed a baby girl called Willow.
Five years after that, Pink gave birth to a second child, this time a son called Jameson.
Unsurprisingly, Pink has described the experience as utterly transformative, as she revealed
on Today,
"I am completely changed since being a mom.
Nothing, I'm much more open, I'm much more accepting of myself, I'm much more thoughtful."
As a result of becoming a parent, Pink thinks more about the future of the planet, and is
deeply invested in making sure it's a safe place for her children.
The singer also loves the joy that her children have given her, especially when she's on tour,
as she told Today,
"The kids bring a levity to the situation that wouldn't otherwise exist.
They make everything fun, they bring so much joy, they're entertainment, they're thoughtful."
In 2017, Pink received one of the biggest accolades in the music industry when MTV presented
her with the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award.
Previous honorees include heavyweights like Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake,
and Rihanna, so Pink is clearly in great company.
Rather than use her speech to thank everyone who'd helped her get there, as stars often
do, Pink did something different.
She dedicated the award to her daughter, Willow, and shared a story about the day the little
one came home sad after being told she was ugly.
In response, Pink made her daughter a PowerPoint presentation featuring pop greats who didn't
conform to gender stereotypes like Prince, Annie Lennox, and David Bowie.
Her speech reached a lot of people, and quickly went viral after the event.
Pink told The Guardian,
"I think it's beautiful, because it was an experience that my daughter and I had, and
if it can make somebody else feel better about themselves, then I'm all for it.
But it's sad that it resonated with that many people.
I hate how much we hate ourselves, and I hate how young it is now.
It’s hard to watch."
In 2019, Pink got to check an item off her bucket list when she was honored with a star
on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
In her acceptance speech, Pink reflected on her impressive body of work and said,
"This is surreal.
I feel like I'm dreaming and if anyone pinches me I'm going to punch them in the left eyebrow...It
has been a trip lately, thinking back over the course of this career that I've somehow
managed to have.
I thought I could have a hit record, but I never thought in my wildest dreams that I
could have two decades of this insane fun with a family of people that I love."
The pop star also spoke about her father, and the importance of believing in yourself.
She told the crowd,
"Today, for me, is a celebration of something that my dad taught me, and that is, to thine
own self be true.
If you walk along this boulevard and you look at these names, there is a power in that...There
is a power in believing in yourself.
There is a power in not giving up on life and on not giving up on yourself."
For almost as long as Pink has had a successful pop career, Carey Hart has been by her side,
proving himself to be the best possible partner that she could ask for.
During an interview with The Guardian, Pink revealed,
"There are moments where I look at [Hart] and he is the most thoughtful, logical, constant...he's
like a rock.
He's a good man.
He's a good dad.
He's just the kind of dad I thought he'd be and then some."
However, Pink and Hart's marriage isn't all wine and roses, and Pink admitted in the same
interview that there are bad days as well as good.
She told The Guardian,
"And then I'll look at him and go: I've never liked you.
There's nothing I like about you.
We have nothing in common...I don't ever wanna see you again.
Then two weeks later I'm like, things are going so good, you guys."
"We come from broken families."
"Mm-hm."
"And we had no model of, 'How are we supposed to keep this family together, and live this
crazy life?'"
Despite this being one of the strangest things about Pink and Carey Hart's marriage, there
is an important takeaway, and that's that marriage isn't always easy, but it can be
worth the effort.
As Pink explained,
"Monogamy is work!
But you do the work and it's good again."
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