Phoebe Bridgers joined by Billie Eilish, MUNA for LA Halloween homecoming

Phoebe Bridgers shed her image as an indie folk singer-songwriter on Friday, Oct. 30 with a transcendent show at Intuit Dome, mixing moving songs of sorrow and joy in a production that made the vast arena feel as intimate as the L.A. music clubs of her youth.

Not, mind you, that there’s any visual proof on your social media today. For the Lost Tour, Bridgers required fans and venues to go phone-free, which on Friday, for the first of three sold-out nights at the Inglewood arena, absolutely enhanced the overall experience.

In place of shaky videos and blurry photographs, it’s the feelings of the night and the power of the performance that’ll live in memories of those who were there.

And for 26 songs, including most of her terrific new album “Lost Weekend,” there was plenty to cherish: Bridgers in costume as Peter Pan, her band dressed as other characters from that story. Surprise appearances by Billie Eilish and MUNA. And spectacular lighting and stage design that wowed all night long.

“Outside” opened the show as it does the new record, the Pasadena native and her band obscured inside an opaque dome that glowed as her vocoder-synthesized vocals filled the arena.

As the set flowed on through “Motion Sickness,” the 2017 single that first dropped Bridgers onto the cooler end of the radio dial, and the gentle, introspective new songs “Kill Me” and “The Governor’s Waltz,” the dome tilted back 90 degrees to face the crowd.

The video screen on its concave underside filled with images of an unfamiliar sun; the full stage backdrop twinkled stars and orbiting planets, and suddenly our “Lost Weekend” felt like a close encounter of the loveliest kind.

“Lost Boys,” the first and so far only single from the new record, kicked things up a notch, the crowd singing loudly to lyrics about loving men who, like the Lost Boys of Peter Pan, “Never grow up, never go home.” It’s a powerful song that moves through verses inspired by her late father and a failed relationship before erupting into a joyful final verse of ecstatic love.

The tempo slowed slightly for “DVD Menu,” “Garden Song” and “Moon Song,” a trio of tracks from “Punisher,” the 2020 album that was her last solo record before “Lost Weekend.” [In the interim, she recorded and toured with Boygenius, her trio with Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker.]

Midway through the show, the spaceship dome descended over the band while Bridgers slipped out to a low remote stage at the back of the arena. After a brief delay when her keyboard initially glitched – “Of course this happened on Halloween,” she joked as one of her techs fixed the issue – she sang the title track of “Lost Weekend” as the round stage slowly rotated.

Hovering over the B-stage, a large satellite-like orb beamed prismatic rainbow-hued lasers over the crowd, Bridgers singing the older favorite “Funeral” and the new “Haunted” as the light ball turned in tandem with the stage.

Bridgers has said much of “Lost Weekend” was inspired by the death four years ago of her father, whose personal demons made their relationship one of both love and distance.

“I’ve always loved Halloween. It’s always been my favorite,” Bridgers said in reference to the costumes she’s often worn and the “Phoebeween” signs outside the arena this weekend.

“I think I was supposed to be Tinkerbell when I was little, but I threw a tantrum because I wanted to be Captain Hook,” she said. “That might have been foreshadowing some of my feelings about men.”

The gap between her father’s death and coming to terms with it, and the new focus on it that the album’s release in August revived, created complicated feelings, Bridgers said.

“I can’t thank everybody enough for going a few hours without your devices,” she said. “It makes a much more positive thing.

“And shout out to my mom [who was at the show on Friday] for giving me the space to grieve someone who was so abusive and made himself a main character in my life,” Bridgers continued. “And all she did was help me.”

“Still Standing,” the song that followed and was dedicated to her father, provided one of the most emotionally powerful moments of the night, with its nuanced lyrics of a daughter and father amid confusion and anger, regret and love.

After “As Above,” sung as silver and purple metallic confetti fell magically like snow through tight beams of white light, Bridgers returned to the main stage where she soon further blew the already overjoyed minds of her fans.

The three women of MUNA joined Bridgers dressed as pirates – her Peter Pan and MUNA pirate Katie Gavin briefly engaging in a toy sword fight – to sing “Silk Chiffon,” the L.A. rock trio’s song on which Bridgers had guested.

“We’re having a little surprise song now,” Bridgers said as the band kicked off “Savior Complex,” another “Punisher” track that she’d only played once before on this fall tour. That got plenty of screams, but never underestimate the explosive power of adding Billie Eilish to Phoebe Bridgers’ stage.

Eilish arrived in a fuzzy pink onesie holding a stuffed animal – Michael, the youngest of the Darling children, whom Peter Pan transports to Never Never Land. After trading off verses with big smiles on their faces, they hugged and Eilish skipped offstage as fans screamed.

“You didn’t have your phones, haha,” Bridgers said as she turned back to the crowd, which, ouch, was so cold! And funny.

The main set wrapped with a booming take on “Kyoto,” an earlier song also partly inspired by Bridgers’ father, and “I Know the End,” which built from a soft, gentle start to a booming finish.

Lights off for the encore break, an almost-forgotten sight appeared around the arena and up and down its multiple levels: The old-fashioned flickering orange flames of lighters held aloft to show support for the artist who had you lock your cell phones inside a pouch for the duration of her show.

With “Lost Weekend (Reprise)” and “Scott Street,” a song soft enough you could almost hear individual voices around you singing, Bridgers finished her show on the remote stage. As she slipped off into darkness, her excellent band played and sang “Never Going Back!” as the spaceship dome slowly lowered back over them.

Journey ended, with no modern-day proof that it ever happened. But those of us who were there? We know.