“I’ll never be able to see faces this close for the rest of this tour, so this is huge,” Meghan Trainor quipped to Tampa’s 1,500-seat Hard Rock Event Center last Monday night.

In recent years, artists capable of filling stadiums and hockey arenas found ways to squeeze in smaller-capacity performances in between. Ed Sheeran had two tours—one intimate, one in stadiums—going at the same time last summer, and in between opening for Olivia Rodrigo and bringing in the biggest crowd at the New York Governor’s Ball, Chappell Roan rocked little ol’ Jannus Live last May.

Before taking her first tour in eight years through a slew of outdoor amphitheaters, Ms. “All About That Bass” decided to launch things with a few smaller, warmup shows that still have the same production, and a lot of it has to do with how she’s now more of a family person than ever.

On top of having the majority of her family (including her father, whose preshow, onstage dancing counted as an opening act) in the building, Trainor’s grandparents live in Florida, and they both managed to come support their granddaughter and her new album Timeless. “You’re making me look so cool for my grandparents,” she joked three songs in.

While Trainor has considered herself a doo-wop artist for years, Timeless sounds more like the pioneers of the genre than any of her previous material did. On it, she collaborates with the likes of rap icon T-Pain and up-and-coming sibling duo Lawrence while pushing self-love and just making it blatantly clear that she couldn’t be happier to be alive, all while blending together some sharp harmonies.

One of the record’s collaborators, TikTok-famous rapper-songwriter Paul Russell (“Lil Boo Thang”) even opened the show with his upbeat material and comments about how great air conditioning is when it comes to beating Florida’s brutal outdoor heat. He didn’t invite Trainor onstage for “Slippin’,” but if you closed your eyes and listened to her prerecorded voice, it was almost like she was onstage.

Around 8:30 p.m., some smoke flowed across a massive, stage-wide platform that you’d expect Trainor to pop out of. Instead, she walked up from stage left, launching into a solo, shortened version of “Mother.” To follow, “Don’t I Make It Look Easy” saw six dancers join her on the platform for the next 90 minutes, featuring all the twerking and in-sync booty-shaking you could ever want in a pop show.

Cell phone lights went up as the room went rainbow on the emotional “Superwoman,” and Trainor got the crowd jumping on a neon green “Better When I’m Dancin’.” She was given a sparkly mic stand for “Crushin’,” which came right after she plugged Timeless for the first time all night, and each of her dancers got a few seconds to shine by themselves on “I Hate It Here,” while their boss was taking a quick pause on stage right.

After inviting her husband Daryl Sabara onstage to dance at the end of “Doin’ It All For You” (“Don’t spin me when I’m doing the high note!” she joked), fans went back to middle and high school for a few minutes when Trainor shook the rafter seats on “All About That Bass.” The rafters wouldn’t shake like that again until the very end of the night on “Made You Look,” which concluded an encore of self-love (“I Wanna Thank Me”) and a heartfelt tribute to her children (“Timeless”).

There’s currently nary a pop singer that doesn’t have a dance troupe, and there’s no denying that it helps. But you look at artists in a similar realm, and ultimately, it’s a bummer that Trainor is one that doesn’t make space onstage for a backing band, and is completely relying on pre-recorded backing tracks. She even shouted out her little brother Justin—also lingering in the crowd—who “did all the music for the entire show.”

Other than Trainor playing a bejeweled ukulele on a rousing “Title” and a white, upright piano on a John Legend-free “Like I’m Gonna Lose You,” there wasn’t a single live instrument in use Monday night. Let’s face it: Touring is mad expensive right now, and maybe some of the tracks on Timeless don’t necessarily require a band. But based on how the doo-wop names that came before her would execute a gig, you can’t help but wonder how “Bestie” would have sounded with at least some live backup singers, rather than prerecordings.

But then again, she is our mother. We listen to her.

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