Drake has filed a defamation lawsuit against Universal Music Group within hours of dismissing a legal petition against the label.
At the time of this publication, Kendrick Lamar’s diss track has a combined 400 million views on YouTube across the music video and audio-only streams. However, Drake contends that the label that represents both himself and Kendrick has prioritized “corporate greed over the safety and well-being of its artists.”
In a lawsuit filed in a New York court on Wednesday, Drake’s legal team argued that UMG approved the publishing of a song that “intended to convey the specific, unmistakable, and false factual allegation that Drake is a pedophile,” the New York Times reported. The lawsuit states that the song Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” urged the public to resort to “vigilante justice” over the pedophile claims.
One of the examples cited by the Canadian rapper’s legal team is the artwork for the song, which shows an image of Drake’s home in Toronto on a map with markings on it to designate a sexual offender. The lawsuit alleges that the photo put the rapper’s safety at risk.
At the height of the two rappers trading diss tracks last summer, a shooting took place at Drake’s property days after the release of “Not Like Us,” in which a security guard was shot and injured. It’s unclear if the rapper was home at the time of the shooting.
The lawsuit also accused UMG of using the Drake and Kendrick Lamar beef to devalue Drake’s brand and gain leverage in future negotiations by increasing the likelihood of deals with more favorable terms for the label.
Universal Music Group has not yet responded to Drake’s lawsuit.
Yesterday, the OVO Sound rapper filed legal documents to withdraw his petition which was filed in November of last year. The petition, which was a precursor for a broader lawsuit, accused UMG and Spotify of using illegal methods to boost the streaming numbers for “Not Like Us,” thus making the song appear more popular than it was.
The rapper accused the label of using bots and a discounted licensing rate in their marketing of the song. However, some industry pundits like Charlamagne Tha God say the label merely did for Kendrick what they previously did for Drake.
Drake has a second legal petition involving UMG allegedly paying iHeartRadio to play Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” is still active in the courts.
