Hear System of a Down’s Serj Tankian Sing on ‘Games of Thrones’ Season 8 Soundtrack

Vladimir Petkov, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
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Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that HBO’s mega-hit fantasy series Games of Thrones ended last night with its season eight finale. The show’s final season was a polarizing affair with many fans criticizing it for a rushed pace and sloppy plotting, but even those who hated on it could hardly deny its power as an epic spectacle complete with massive ice-zombie battles and lots of dragon’s fire. Series composer Ramin Djawadi played a big part in generating that visceral power with the music he penned for Game of Thrones, and for the series’ final season, he asked System of a Down frontman and fellow score composer Serj Tankian to lend his inimitable voice to one of the soundtrack’s songs, “The Rains of Castamere.” Tankian broke the news and shared the tune via social media.

“After the epic conclusion to @GameOfThrones, I’m honored to announce that my friend and series composer @Djawadi_Ramin invited me to contribute vocals to “Rains of Castamere” for the Season 8 soundtrack. Check it out here – https://lnk.to/got8_sndkRa – Peace, Serj,” he wrote. You can hear the song below.

It has been a busy few days for Tankian, who performed at this weekend’s inaugural Sonic Temple Art & Music Festival with System of a D0wn and also joined Tom Morello onstage during the Rage Against the Machine/Prophets of Rage guitarist’s Sonic Temple solo set for a cover of Audioslave’s “Like a Stone.” You can see fan-shot video of both appearances below.