Canadian rapper Drake maintains his legal conflict with American Kendrick Lamar by attacking their joint label Universal Music Group (UMG) for defamation on Wednesday, amid accusations of pedophilia.
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The two hip-hop stars have been rivals for years and released several vitriolic tracks in 2024 to criticize and attack each other, a classic practice of this cultural and musical genre.
The Canadian Aubrey Drake Graham, 38, had already accused UMG at the end of November of having inflated the listenings of the 37-year-old Californian Kendrick Lamar on the platforms and of having defamed him, in two proceedings in New York and Texas.
These were not formal complaints, but first procedural steps before possible legal action.
This time, in a civil complaint before the Manhattan federal prosecutor’s office, Drake accuses Universal of having “approved, published and launched a campaign to create viral +buzz+ from a rap song”.
This alleged smear campaign “aimed to create false allegations that Drake was a pedophile criminal and suggested that the public should respond” by boycotting the Canadian, according to this complaint consulted by AFP.
In the song “Not like us”, Kendrick Lamar, winner of a prestigious Pulitzer Prize, accuses Drake of having relationships with underage girls and calls him a “pedophile”.
The Canadian responds that their joint record company has chosen “the profit of the company over the safety and well-being of its artists”.
He denounces the fact of having been the target of “physical threats” – gunshots had injured a security guard at his property in Toronto in May – and of being “bombarded by online harassment”.
“Not like us”, which has exceeded 900 million plays on Spotify, has become one of the artist’s most popular tracks and received several nominations at the next Grammy Awards, including that of best song of the ‘year.
Kendrick Lamar was also chosen to perform the halftime concert of the Super Bowl, the final of the American football championship, at the beginning of February in New Orleans, an immense privilege for an artist in the United States.
Universal Music Group promised in a press release to “protect (its) collaborators and (its) reputation” and denied “any act of defamation” past and present.
