Pussy Riot’s debut album is finally here — and Avenged Sevenfold are on it
Fourteen years of protest, imprisonment, surveillance and exile, distilled into fourteen tracks. That’s “CYKA”, the long-awaited debut album from Pussy Riot, due June 12. To preview it, the Nadya Tolokonnikova-led collective has released “Candy Dopamine”, a collaboration with Avenged Sevenfold co-written with vocalist M. Shadows and guitarist Zacky Vengeance. The track blends pop with alternative rock and punishing riffs, with M. Shadows' autotuned vocals threading through Tolokonnikova’s delivery.
The two acts have history. In 2023, Tolokonnikova appeared on a reworked version of A7X’s “We Love You” from Life Is But A Dream…, retitled “We Love You Moar”, built around raising awareness of LGBTQ+ persecution in Russia. “Candy Dopamine” arrives from a more personal angle: Tolokonnikova describes it as “a heartbreak ballad about prescription drug culture”. “It started with my dependence on antidepressants, but it’s also looking at everyone now mentalhealthmaxxing and looksmaxxing via pills and injections. It’s not a judgment — it’s just an observation and my personal experience with pills for my PTSD and depression”.
The album announcement itself was pure Pussy Riot. In April 2026, Tolokonnikova was formally indicted by Russia’s Investigative Committee on charges of violating the country’s foreign agent law. Weeks later, the group chose the Venice Biennale — timed deliberately to coincide with Russia’s controversial return to the event — to launch “CYKA”. Alongside Ukrainian activist group FEMEN, they stormed the Russian pavilion with clouds of pink smoke. The footage became the video for album track “Disobey”.
The full tracklist spans “Gods Left”, “Pain / Боль”, “Nothing To Lose”, “Gore” featuring B-Real of Cypress Hill, “Utopia” with Salem Ilese, “Murka”, “Faceless Pigs”, “God Loves The Fierce / Бог любит лютых”, “Cancel Me”, “Blizzard”, and an outro. Following the album’s release, Pussy Riot will perform live on June 20 in Paris as part of the “Beyond The Streets” exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette.
