Pussy Riot Release Anti-Trump and Anti-Putin Videos, Announce xxx EP

Most of us are too terrified to even imagine what a Trump presidency would look like … but of course Nadya Tolokonnikova, a fearless founder of Pussy Riot, went there. Yesterday she released two music videos slamming Trump and Putin. The first, embedded above, is set in a dystopian future in which Trump’s been elected.

It’s called “Make America Great Again,” and follows Tolokonnikova as she’s arrested for being a Russian “outsider” and is subsequently beaten and branded with words like “fat pig” and “pervert.” Doctors forcibly perform an invasive inspection on her to decide whether she’s had an abortion.

Many of the images and concepts are disturbing, but the music itself is catchy and light. That tension makes the scenes feel all the more messed up, like a dangerous political agenda dressed in populist rhetoric. Tolokonnikova croons:

Did your mama come from Mexico
Papa come from Palestine
Sneaking all through Syria
Crossing all the border lines

Let other people in
Listen to your women
Stop killing black children
Make America Great Again

In the second video, “Organs,” Tolokonnikova bathes in blood and sings in Russian about repressed female sexuality, militarization and being a political prisoner (as she was from 2012-2013). Turn on closed captions to get the English translation—there are lyrical gems like, “My president replaced his dick with an ICBM.”