Drake escalates his beef with Kendrick Lamar, takes legal action against his record label for inflating his rival diss track ‘Not Like Us’

Canadian rapper Drake has taken legal action against Universal Music Group (UMG) and Spotify, alleging a conspiracy to artificially inflate interest in Kendrick Lamar’s diss track “Not Like Us,” while suppressing his own music.

In a petition filed to the New York Supreme Court on Monday, November 25, Aubrey Drake Graham, a.k.a. Drake, accuses UMG of employing a network of bots and a “pay-to-play scheme” to “manipulate and saturate the streaming services and airwaves” with Lamar’s hit song “Not Like Us,” at Drake’s disadvantage.

The complaint states that UMG, with its deals with both performers, reportedly paid Spotify to promote “Not Like Us” to users searching for other unrelated songs and artists, claiming they also paid Apple to redirect users searching for Drake’s music to “Not Like Us.”

According to the filing, a petition by Drake and his company, Frozen Moments LLC, asking the court to order UMG and Spotify to preserve all relevant documents and communications in advance of a pending lawsuit — UMG has so far “refused to engage” with Drake over the issue, instead pointing the finger at Lamar and telling Drake to sue Lamar, not UMG.

Drake is reportedly upset with UMG’s allegedly shady business practices, not Lamar or his lyrics.

Drake hit back at Lamar with his own tracks, calling the Compton rapper a domestic abuser and casting doubt on the paternity of his child.)

In an email, a UMG spokesman said, “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.”

UMG was one of Spotify’s earliest supporters, inking a multi-year global licensing agreement with the streaming giant in 2020, Drake’s court filing states. It cites UMG’s financial reporting, which showed some $2.3 billion in earnings from Spotify in 2023, accounting for nearly 20 percent of the label’s revenues.

In May of this year, with streaming so important to its bottom line, UMG “did not rely on chance, or even ordinary business practices,” to achieve success with Lamar’s latest release, according to the filing.

“It instead launched a campaign to manipulate and saturate the streaming services and airwaves with a song, ‘Not Like Us,’ in order to make that song go viral, including by using ‘bots’ and pay-to-play agreements,” the filing states, claiming UMG charged Spotify 30 percent less than its usual licensing rates in exchange for Spotify pushing recommendations for “Not Like Us” to “users who are searching for other unrelated songs and artists.”

“Neither UMG nor Spotify disclosed that Spotify had received compensation of any kind in exchange for recommending the Song,” the filing contends, claiming that such practices contravene the Communications Act of 1934.

In June, a “whistleblower” revealed on a podcast that Lamar’s label had paid him to set up a bot network that would generate 30 million streams on Spotify in the first few days after the May 3 release of “Not Like Us,” according to the filing. The leaker claimed he had been promised a cash payment plus a percentage of the song’s sales in exchange for his help.

The filing says UMG also paid to quietly “inflate” the number of views Lamar’s “Not Like Us” video received, paid traditional radio stations for extra airplay, and claims the label’s alleged under-the-table streaming deals extended beyond Spotify.

“Online sources reported that when users asked Siri to play the album ‘Certified Loverboy’ by recording artist Aubrey Drake Graham d/b/a Drake, Siri instead played ‘Not Like Us,’ which contains the lyric ‘certified pedophile,’ an allegation against Drake,” the filing states.

Additionally, UMG paid social media influencers to “promote and endorse” Lamar’s song without disclosing the financial arrangements, which reportedly generated nearly 900 million streams on Spotify for “Not Like Us,” a record-breaking achievement as the most-streamed song in a single day for a hip-hop track and the most-streamed diss track in Spotify history. The song also became a massive hit on radio and became the best-selling rap song of 2024, according to the complaint.

The complaint further alleges that Drake has received information suggesting UMG is attempting to conceal its schemes, including terminating employees perceived as loyal to Drake.

Drake is alleging violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), as well as the New York Deceptive Business Act and the New York False Advertising Act in this complaint.