Fyodor Valentinovich Chistyakov was born on December 28, 1967 in Leningrad. At the age of 8 he started attending classes in a music section at a comprehensive school, majoring in bayan.

Fyodor Chistyakov is known as the songwriter, singer and bayanist of the rock band Nol’ that is still considered in Russia a cult model for the Russian rock music. The project attracted public’s attention thanks to Fyodor Chistyakov’s original manner of playing the bayan, the instrument unusual for rock music as such, as well as sharp social lyrics and an expressive scenic image of a lad wearing a Russian shirt and playing rock'n'roll on accordion. In 1991 the band Nol’ released its most famous album The Song about unrequited love to the Homeland, with lots of songs from it becoming hits.

In 1992 Chistyakov, while staying at the summer cottage of the well-known rock party-goer Irina Linnik attacked and wounded her with a knife; subsequently at the interrogation he motivated his act explaining that she is a witch. Chistyakov spent about a year in prison and then was sent for compulsory treatment in psychiatric clinic, where spent one more year. In 1995 Fyodor Chistyakov joined the religious organization of Jehovah Witnesses, which literally rescued him, according to the musician himself. In 1997 Fyodor Chistyakov started his solo career.