Pussy Riot Drops Anti-Putin Track on Russian Election Day

The Russian group's latest single is aptly titled "Elections,"just dropped as Russian citizens headed to the polls on Sunday (March 18) to vote in their presidential election, and known enemies of the state Pussy Riot chose to make a point with the track taunting Vladimir Putin. “Elections”  was shared on Twitter with the pointed caption: “it’s the election day in Russia (guess who’ll win??).” The thinly veiled sarcasm was a nod to the fact that strongman Putin was expected to crush the competition -- which he did, winning more than 76 percent of the vote -- in an election that many saw as a rubber-stamp on his rule.

The new protest anthem features the lyrics "Six years we're gonna fight, fight/ We're not gonna obey during this term."
Last month, the band shared that two of its members went missing following their detainment by Russian police upon their attempted entry into Crimea. The band is currently on tour throughout North America, and recently released a new song with Dave Sitek of TV on the Radio.


Pussy Riot released a statement along with the song. "What 18 years of Putin’s power has brought to us?" it read. "Arrests, poisonings, tortures, murders of political activists. Institutional corruption which is HUGE. Total erosion of democratic institutions. Giant economic inequality. Worsening of prison conditions. Environmental catastrophe in lots of industrial regions of Russia. Censorship everywhere – in media, in education, in internet, in people’s heads. Self-censorship, caused by fear. You should not be deceived, this event on 18th of March is not elections. Falsifications, eliminations of political opponents, Kremlin-controlled media leave no chance to anybody except Putin."