There’s a school of thought that if an artist’s stage production is elaborate, their pyrotechnics plentiful, it’s all an effort to make up for what they lack in songcraft or vocal ability. This school of thought emanates from the Royal College of Insufferable Bores.

On Friday night at Glasgow’s Hampden Park Pink - stylised P!nk - takes 50,000 through her Summer Carnival, and while there are more gimmicks than you can shake a stick at it’s most certainly not masking any vocal weaknesses - nor does the fact she’s often singing upside down while suspended 50ft in the air seem to faze her much.

If you’ve got a mega-hit called ‘Get The Party Started’ it’d be a bit rude not to open with it and Pink duly does, emerging from an enormous set of red lips on the roof of the stage and partaking in the first of many acrobatic stunts.

‘Raise Your Glass’ follows, the audience duly obliging, while ‘Just Like A Pill’, her first UK number one, gets the first mass singalong of the evening.

For the second portion of the show a piano is brought out on stage, the singer introducing a cover of Bob Dylan’s ‘Make You Feel My Love’ by declaring she wishes she’d penned it but “it’s way too pretty for me to have written it”.

A missed chord at the end is blamed on the fact her hands are numb from the cold. Given that Taylor Swift experienced cold-related cramping on her first night in Edinburgh, it’s to be hoped there’s not some kind of huge WhatsApp group for America’s top pop stars or we may never see an outdoor show again thanks to a summer which, even by Scottish standards, has been miserable.

Ms Swift perhaps serves as a point of comparison. The issue with huge stadium shows is how, or indeed if, you create a sense of intimacy. The Eras Tour doesn’t attempt to, preferring instead to blow the audience away with its sheer scale and ambition.

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50,000 fans were at the Hampden show50,000 fans were at the Hampden show (Image: Newsquest)

Summer Carnival, on the other hand, sees Pink accept a homemade effigy from the audience - “it looks just like me” - and stop to read signs and accept sweets from the audience.

“My kids take everything from me,” she says as she’s handed a Malteaser. “So this is the only place I can safely eat candy… because I have security around the stage.”

That sense of intimacy is heightened by a stripped back portion in the middle of the show which features Pink and guitarist Justin Derrico going through - arguably one too many - slower numbers.

A more restrained version of ‘Don’t Let Me Get Me’ reflects the close to 25 years that have passed since its release: the line “tired of being compared to damn Britney Spears” is amended to “sweet Britney”.

A cover of ‘What’s Up’ by 4 Non Blondes turns Hampden into a massive hen party, before another intricate aerial stunt for ‘Try’ - her insurance premiums must be off the charts.

‘Trustfall’ sees backing dancers leap from the stage and spring back up on a giant trampoline before the entire on-stage crew are given their moment in the spotlight following ‘Blow Me (One Last Kiss)’.

As the opening riff of final song ‘So What’ kicks in, Pink declares “I’m coming to see you in the back!”

With that she’s off, flying around the stadium as she belts out arguably her signature track.

Fireworks shoot into the night sky as she returns to terra firma and departs the stage with her band. Yep, still a rock star right enough.