Universal Music Group has responded to a defamation lawsuit filed by Drake earlier today (January 15).<\/p>\n
Within the lawsuit, the superstar artist accuses UMG of promoting a \u201cfalse and malicious narrative\u201d about him via the content of the lyrics, single artwork, and music video for the Kendrick Lamar diss track Not Like Us<\/em>.<\/p>\n The lawsuit was filed just hours after Drake, via his company Frozen Moments LLC, withdrew<\/a> an earlier legal petition against Universal Music Group<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Spotify<\/a>, which accused the companies of a scheme to \u201cartificially inflate\u201d Kendrick Lamar\u2019s diss track, Not Like Us.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n In response to the defamation lawsuit, a spokesperson for Universal Music Group told us today that, \u201cnot only are these claims untrue, but the notion that we would seek to harm the reputation of any artist \u2014 let alone Drake \u2014 is illogical”.<\/p>\n UMG’s spokesperson added the company “will vigorously defend this litigation to protect our people and our reputation”.<\/p>\n You can read UMG’s statement in full below:<\/p>\n \u201cNot only are these claims untrue, but the notion that we would seek to harm the reputation of any artist \u2014 let alone Drake \u2014 is illogical. We have invested massively in his music and our employees around the world have worked tirelessly for many years to help him achieve historic commercial and personal financial success,” UMG’s spokesperson.<\/p>\n “We have not and do not engage in defamation \u2014 against any individual”<\/p>\n UMG spokesperson<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n They added: “Throughout his career, Drake has intentionally and successfully used UMG to distribute his music and poetry to engage in conventionally outrageous back-and-forth \u2018rap battles\u2019 to express his feelings about other artists.<\/p>\n “He now seeks to weaponize the legal process to silence an artist\u2019s creative expression and to seek damages from UMG for distributing that artist\u2019s music.<\/p>\n “We have not and do not engage in defamation \u2014 against any individual. At the same time, we will vigorously defend this litigation to protect our people and our reputation, as well as any artist who might directly or indirectly become a frivolous litigation target for having done nothing more than write a song.\u201d<\/p>\n Drake claims in the lawsuit that the release and promotion of the recording has resulted in \u201cphysical threat to Drake\u2019s safety\u201d as well as \u201cthe bombardment of online harassment\u201d and as such, \u201cfears for the safety and security of himself, his family and his friends\u201d.<\/p>\n Elsewhere in the complaint, Drake claims that the \u201clawsuit is not about the artist who created Not Like Us.<\/em>\u00a0It is instead entirely about UMG, the music company that decided to publish, promote, exploit, and monetize allegations that it understood were not only false but dangerous\u201d.<\/p>\n You can read the filing in\u00a0full here.<\/a><\/p>\n A statement issued by Drake\u2019s legal team at\u00a0Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP<\/strong>\u00a0reads: \u201cDrake filed a lawsuit against his label, Universal Music Group, to hold UMG accountable for knowingly promoting false and defamatory allegations against him.<\/p>\n \u201cBeginning on May 4, 2024 and every day since, UMG has used its massive resources as the world\u2019s most powerful music company to elevate a dangerous and inflammatory message that was designed to assassinate Drake\u2019s character, and led to actual violence at Drake\u2019s doorstep.<\/p>\n \u201cUMG wants the public to believe that this is a fight between rappers, but this lawsuit is not brought against Kendrick Lamar. This lawsuit reveals the human and business consequences to UMG\u2019s elevation of profits over the safety and well-being of its artists, and shines a light on the manipulation of artists and the public for corporate gain.\u201d<\/p>\n The original petition,\u00a0filed<\/a>\u00a0in November 2024 but withdrawn this week, and which you can\u00a0read in full here,<\/a>\u00a0alleged that UMG \u201claunched a campaign to manipulate and saturate the streaming services and airwaves with a song,\u00a0Not Like Us<\/em>, in order to make that song go viral, including by using \u2018bots\u2019 and pay-to-play agreements.\u201d<\/p>\n The petition also claimed that \u201cUMG charged Spotify licensing rates 30 percent lower than its usual licensing rates for\u00a0Not Like Us<\/em>\u00a0in exchange for Spotify affirmatively recommending the Song to users who are searching for other unrelated songs and artists.\u201d<\/p>\n It continued to allege: \u201cUMG nor Spotify disclosed that Spotify had received compensation of any kind in exchange for recommending the Song.\u201d<\/p>\n Last month, in response to Drake\u2019s allegations about a 30% lower rate in exchange for recommendations, a Spotify spokesperson told MBW: \u201cSpotify has no economic incentive for users to stream\u00a0Not Like Us<\/em>\u00a0over any of Drake\u2019s tracks.\u201d<\/p>\n Both Drake and Lamar release their records via UMG and its\u00a0Republic Records<\/a>\u00a0and Interscope, respectively.<\/p>\n Not Like Us\u00a0(Interscope),\u00a0recorded by Lamar\u00a0was released<\/a>\u00a0as part of a\u00a0bitter rap feud with Drake on May 4, as part of a series of three diss tracks, all released within a few days of each other (the other tracks are\u00a0Euphoria\u00a0and\u00a0Meet The Grahams).<\/p>\n The track reached No.1 on the Hot 100, marking Lamar\u2019s fourth-ever US No.1, and his second that year, following\u00a0Like That<\/i>\u00a0by\u00a0Future<\/b>,\u00a0Metro Boomin<\/b>\u00a0& Kendrick Lamar, which hit No.1 in April. The track also\u00a0marked the first<\/a>\u00a0US No.1 for\u00a0Not Like Us\u00a0<\/i>producer\u00a0Mustard<\/b>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" UMG: “We have not and do not engage in defamation \u2014 against any individual.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":220743,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-220733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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