PROBABLY the last time most people came across Pussy Riot was seeing them dragged off the pitch at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow by some rather burly security types during this summer`s World Cup Final, writes Mick Burgess.

With references to “Gulag” and “Siberia” amongst other words appearing in newspaper reports, no-one quite knew whether the Russian Anarcho-Punk protesters would even be free let alone able to travel to undertake their first tour of the UK this summer.

While front woman, Maria Alyokhina managed to dodge border control and drive 1000 miles overland to make the shows, Olga Kurachova was refused a UK visa preventing her from joining the tour, however as Pussy Riot is more a collective with the sum exceeding the number of band members on stage there was always someone to step into the breach to join fellow founder member and saxophone player, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova.

With Maria, initially wearing a ski mask and Nadezhda joined onstage by two men, an underpants wearing synthesizer player and a vocalist/dancer this was something of a surreal experience.

Although citing Punk legends Angelic Upstarts, Sham 69 and Cockney Rejects as major influences, anyone expecting a raw romp through some fuzzed-up guitars were in for a surprise as the electronic beats and stabbing sythns intermixed with some jarring blasts of saxophone were more New York art house than UK Punk.

With Maria`s monologue of protest in her native Russian at the forefront of the show, the video screen to the rear featured startling images along with translations for those who`s grasp of the Russian language is not quite so fluent.

“Intense”, “intriguing” and “baffling” were all words springing to mind during Pussy Riot`s performance and with the Riverside pretty full with a mixture of activists, students and the plain curious coming to see what all the fuss was about, one thing is for sure Newcastle has never seen anything quite like this before.