Drake Files Defamation Lawsuit Against UMG Over Kendrick Lamar Diss Track
Canadian rapper Drake has initiated a defamation lawsuit against Universal Music Group (UMG), alleging the company spread a “false and malicious narrative” through Kendrick Lamar’s diss track *Not Like Us*, which labels him a pedophile.
According to *TMZ*, Drake claims in the lawsuit that UMG knowingly promoted Lamar’s song despite its defamatory content. He accuses the music giant of allowing the “inflammatory and shocking allegations” to circulate and asserts that UMG used unethical methods to amplify the track’s reach.
The suit alleges that UMG paid a third party to use bots, inflating the track’s streams by over 30 million, and engaged in a “pay-for-play” scheme with at least one radio promoter to position the song as a chart-topper using fraudulent data.
Drake clarified in the filing that the lawsuit is not directed at Kendrick Lamar himself but at UMG. “This lawsuit is not about the artist who created *Not Like Us*,” the document states. “It is, instead, entirely about UMG, the music company that decided to publish, promote, exploit, and monetize a song containing false claims.”