HBO Hopes to Grow “Game of Thrones'” Audience Through The Power of Hip-Hop

HBO

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Behold the greatest sentence I’ve read this week/month/maybe ever:

Time Warner’s HBO hopes to attract more rap fans to watch Game of Thrones with a hip-hop mixtape featuring rappers like Big Boi.

Game of Thrones, HBO’s hit fantasy saga of blood, sex, and politics, returns for a fourth season in April. The season premiere will be preceded by this 10-song mixtape, titled Catch the Throne, which is set for release on Friday. (Click here for the track list; songs are based on specific episodes of the show.) The featured artists, such as Common, Wale, and reggaeton star Daddy Yankee, seem super-enthusiastic about nerding out over this fantasy epic. For instance, here is “Mother of Dragons” by Big Boi (of Outkast fame), which includes the lyric:

“Fuck the Lannisters and everybody ridin’ with ’em / Jon Snow and the Night’s Watch finna slide some iron in ’em.”

(“HBO has not revealed if a Tyrion response track is forthcoming,” reported Rolling Stone.)

And here’s “King Slayer” by Wale:

“Usin’ my king knack for words, as a actual sword / I could decapitate a rapper / If he be lacking, he gone.

(Wale has previously rapped extensively about his love for the TV show Seinfeld, and has even collaborated with Jerry Seinfeld himself.)

George R. R. Martin, the famous 65-year-old author of the books on which the show is based, was not available to comment on the Game of Thrones rap mixtape. “I am sure he loves it but I won’t be able to get a quote for ya,” says Vince Gerardis, Martin’s manager and a Game of Thrones co-executive producer (along with Martin). “I love it,” Gerardis added.

While we’re on the subject, watch our Game of Thrones attack ads—in which we imagine what it would be like if super-PACs and dark-money outfits existed in the Seven Kingdoms.

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