Drake drops legal action over Kendrick Lamar’s song

Drake has dropped a legal case against Universal Music and Spotify, in which he accused the companies of conspiring against him by boosting streams of Kendrick Lamar’s diss track, Not Like Us.

canadian star action was taken last novemberHe alleged that music companies had used bots, payola, and other methods to promote Lamar’s songs, leading to him being accused of pedophilia.

“Not Like Us’s record-breaking expansion on streaming, sales and radio play was deliberate and appears to have depended on unregulated and unfair business practices,” court documents allege.

However, on Tuesday, Drake’s attorneys voluntarily withdrew the pre-action filing, effectively ending the case.

According to court documents filed in New York, Star met with representatives from Spotify and Universal on Tuesday to discuss the case.

Spotify, which had filed the protest, had no objection to the withdrawal and closure. Universal, which had filed no opposition, reserved its position.

a related matterFiled in Texas against Universal and radio network iHeartRadio, still active.

Not Like Us was considered the decisive blow in the long-running feud between Drake and Lamar, which dates back to the early 2010s.

In the song, Lamar alleged that Drake “likes them young” and accused him of using other, more credible rappers to boost his profile.

About 24 hours later, Drake responded with a track titled The Heart Part 6, where he dismissed the allegations, saying “I’ve never been with anyone underage”. He also claimed that he had given “false” information to Lamar through a double agent.

However, their response failed to garner as much attention as Not Like Us, which debuted at number one on the US charts and attracted over 1 billion streams on Spotify.

Going to the courts, Drake accused Universal – which distributes both his music and Lamar’s music – of artificially inflating the song count.

In court documents, he claimed that the label licensed the song “at significantly reduced rates to Spotify” and used bots to stream the song, creating “the false impression that the song was more popular than it was in reality”. .

The papers were not a lawsuit, but a “pre-action petition”, in which Drake’s lawyers sought to gain access to internal documents from Spotify and Universal that might have supported their case.

In a statement at the time, Universal told the BBC: “The suggestion that (the company) would do anything to undermine any of its artists is offensive and untrue.

“We use the highest ethical practices in our marketing and promotional campaigns. No amount of fanciful and absurd legal arguments in this pre-action submission can hide the fact that fans choose the music they want to hear.”

Spotify also responded that “there was no economic incentive for users to stream any of Drake’s tracks on Not Like Us”.

The Swedish streaming company later filed a protest over Drake’s petition, stating that it “should be rejected”.

Music industry experts were skeptical that the charges would ever reach trial.

Some suggested that Drake was using the court to leverage Universal for information that could allow him to potentially sue for breach of contract and get out of his deal.

But entertainment lawyer Kevin Cassini said the proposed legal action could do more harm than good to Drake’s reputation.

The media coverage “really only serves to draw more attention to songs that Drake finds offensive or objectionable,” He told Rolling Stone magazine,

“And I think the song’s streaming numbers will go up again.”