The diss tracks war between Drake and Kendrick Lamar continues to rumble on, with Drake starting legal action against Universal Music Group and Spotify. The Canadian rapper is accusing them of “illegally” boosting streams of his rival’s diss track Not Like Us, by allegedly using bots, undisclosed payments, and biased recommendations.
Attorneys for Drake’s company Frozen Moments allege that: “UMG did not rely on chance, or even ordinary business practices. It instead launched a campaign to manipulate and saturate the streaming services and airwaves.”
They also accuse UMG of violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), implementing deceptive pay-to-play business practices, and using false advertising under New York state law. In court documents, the attorneys claim they tried to “meet and confer with UMG” for the past several months,” but the label “declined to enter into substantive negotiations” and instead allegedly insisted that they take it up with Lamar directly.
Among the specific claims made is that UMG offered Spotify compensation to recommend the song to Spotify subscribers: “On information and belief, UMG charged Spotify licensing rates 30 per cent lower than its usual licensing rates for ‘Not Like Us’ in exchange for Spotify affirmatively recommending the song to users who are searching for other unrelated songs and artists.” UMG has denied the allegations in the court document are true.
Elsewhere it is claimed that Universal paid Apple to have their digital assistant ‘Siri’ “purposely misdirect” users to Not Like Us when they ask it to play Drake’s 2021 album Certified Lover Boy. It should be pointed out that Not Like Us does actually include Kendrick’s lyric/slur ‘Certified Lover Boy?/ Certified pedophile.’
It should noted however the dispute is technically not a full lawsuit. Instead it has been filed as a ‘pre-action’ petition, which under New York law is a procedure filed to secure information prior to a formal lawsuit. In hip-hop parlance, sh*t hasn’t yet got serious. But it could well soon.
As you’d expect Universal have strenuously denied Drake’s claims, putting out a statement saying: “The suggestion that UMG would do anything to undermine any of its artists is offensive and untrue. We employ the highest ethical practices in our marketing and promotional campaigns. No amount of contrived and absurd legal arguments in this pre-action submission can mask the fact that fans choose the music they want to hear.”
Not Like Us, of course, went straight in at Number One in the Billboard chart in May, breaking a number of records along the way. Lamar unleashed GNX, a surprise new album on unsuspecting punters last week and in all likelihood that too will go straight in at Number One this Friday.
