CHVRCHES took it upon themselves to craft their steeped-in-synth cover of the Game of Thrones theme song, but David Benioff and Dan Weiss — the showrunners behind the HBO fantasy epic — actually requested a specific band to record a studio version of “The Bear & the Maiden Fair,” a song featured on last night’s episode (April 14).
“[‘The Bear & the Maiden Fair’] is one of the most popular songs in Westeros, beloved by nobles and commoners alike, sung at taverns and feasts and etc,” Benioff and Weiss told Entertainment Weekly recently. “We wanted our rendition to be bawdy and a little sloppy — drunken musicians getting up on the table and jamming while the rowdy party continues around them.” Naturally, they reached out to bar band emeritus the Hold Steady, who happily obliged with a boozy, shout-along interpretation of the fictional standard.
“The Bear & Maiden Fair” features lyrics by A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin and music by the television show’s composer, Ramin Djawadi, just like “The Rains of Castamere,” the song that Trouble Will Find Me headcases the National contributed to GoT last year. Stream the Hold Steady’s latest down below, and look out for it on Record Store Day (April 20) when it will be pressed on 7-inch vinyl along with previously unreleased track “Criminal Fingers.”
