It’s freezing in Dublin – and, it’s not just we who think so. When the Hot Press crew arrive at the Button Factory, Pussy Riot’s Maria Alyokhina (Masha) is going for a cigarette, and complaining about the cold. For this to come from a Russian (arguably one of the toughest around, what’s more), is reassuring. We have not been exaggerating all day!

Despite the frosty situation outside, however, we’re given a much warmer welcome from Masha after she’s had her smoke. Earlier in the day, when she received our request to conduct an interview about Repeal the 8th, she had jumped at the chance. Ready and willing to learn everything we can tell her – and fellow Pussy Riot members Olga and Kyrill – about the campaign, she is at once both attentive and shocked. We spend two hours together, shooting the breeze.

The band’s interest in the issue is genuine. One of the most infamous activist groups currently in our stratosphere, they’ve been involved in consciously revolutionary actions, tackling political, feminist and humanitarian issues head-on through their music, since they first banded together in 2011. They’ve faced tremendous repercussions in Russia for their decision to stand up and be counted, being arrested and charged with hooliganism, and consequently sent to two years in prison – five months of which Masha herself spent in solitary confinement (“For her own protection,” the authorities claimed). Her book Riot Days, and the performance art piece they’re performing in the Button Factory, are both based around that experience.