As the ongoing legal war between Drake and Kendrick Lamar intensifies, the Canadian rapper has filed a second lawsuit against Universal Music Group for defamation. He alleged that his record label knowingly allowed Lamar to call him a “certified pedophile” in his latest track Not Like Us.
The new filing, which was made public on Tuesday, November 26, also alleged that UMG Recordings "funneled payments to iHeartRadio and its radio stations as part of a pay-to-play scheme." The latest allegations come a day after he filed a pre-petition in New York accusing UMG of illegally boosting Lamar’s track.
A report in Billboard said that Drake’s lawyers argued that “UMG could have refused to release or distribute the song or required the offending material to be edited and/or removed,” but the label chose to do the opposite.
They further wrote, “UMG designed, financed and then executed a plan to turn ‘Not Like Us’ into a viral mega-hit with the intent of using the spectacle of harm to Drake and his businesses to drive consumer hysteria and, of course, massive revenues.”
The second lawsuit is also categorised as a pre-petition filing which is aimed at taking depositions from key figures at UMG and iHeartRadio so as to obtain more information that could help Drake in future lawsuit. Neither of the parties have yet responded on Drake’s recent actions.
More details on the petition filed in Texas court by Drake’s lawyers
According to the court documents received by The Independent, the Texas filing reads:
“Before it approved the release of the song, UMG knew that the song itself, as well as its accompanying album art and music video, attacked the character of another one of UMG’s most prominent artists, Drake, by falsely accusing him of being a sex offender, engaging in pedophilic acts, harboring sex offenders, and committing other criminal sexual acts. Specifically, the song calls Drake a ‘certified pedophile,’ a ‘predator,’ and someone whose name should ‘be registered and placed on neighborhood watch.’”
UMG has not officially responded yet, but in its intial response to New York filing by Drake’s lawyers it said that suggesting that UMG might be involved in undermining its artists is “offensive” and “untrue.”
The label added, “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.”
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In the initial filing, Drake’s lawyers asked the judge to order UMG to preserve a record of its communication with Spotify as it alleged the streaming service of using bots, pay-to-play agreements and false advertising to make Not Like Us viral. In the Texas filing, they accused UMG of being involved in similar tactics with iHeartMedia and asked the court to order iHeart executives to reveal details of the alleged conspiracy.
As of now, Drake has enough evidence to file a defamation claim and he might pursue claims of civil fraud and RICO violations depending on the outcome of depositions from iHeartRadio.
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