Universal Music Says Drake “Lost a Rap Battle” and It Shouldn’t Be Held Liable for Hyperbole

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In “Family Matters,” Drake‘s penultimate diss track in his feud with Kendrick Lamar, the Toronto rapper says that his West Coast adversary abuses his wife and isn’t the father to his son. “When you put your hands on your girl, Is it self-defense ‘cause she bigger than you?” Drake sings. “They hired a crisis management team. To clean up the fact that you beat on your queen.”

Universal Music Group, in a bid on Monday to dismiss a defamation lawsuit filed by Drake, points to that accusation in arguments that diss tracks regularly advance personal, vitriolic assertions that listeners don’t take seriously. Context matters, UMG says, claiming that “Not Like Us” conveys opinion through exaggeration in a way that can’t be understood as defamatory.

Drake “lost a rap battle that he provoked and in which he willingly participated,” states UMG in the filing. “Instead of accepting the loss like the unbothered rap artist he often claims to be, he has sued his own record label in a misguided attempt to salve his wounds.”

Lamar (Interscope Records) and Drake (Republic Records) are represented by different divisions of UMG. Their rap battle turned to court earlier this year when the Toronto rapper claimed that UMG, which holds exclusive control over licensing of “Not Like Us,” spread defamatory allegations that he’s a pedophile by making secret payments and offering reduced licensing rates to third parties to promote the song, with the goal of devaluing his music and brand amid contract negotiations.

The complaint details the timeline of the feud, beginning with Drake’s 2023 collaboration with J. Cole “First Person Shooter,” in which the pair proclaimed itself the “big three” alongside Lamar. In response, the Compton rapper rejected the idea that they’re his equals in “Like That.” Several diss tracks followed, with the musicians hurling increasingly spiteful insults at each other relating to accusations of domestic abuse, exploitation and pedophilia. It culminated with Lamar’s release of the anthemic West Coast banger in May, leading to spectators crowning him the winner of the battle.

Pointing to the tone of “Not Like Us,” UMG says the track consists of “epithets, fiery rhetoric and hyperbole” regularly heard in rap. The exaggerated imagery in the music video, the company adds, reinforces that the track is not intended to be making factual assertions. One example: the video opens with Lamar whispering to a clown that he sees “dead people” — a nod to The Sixth Sense in which he implies that he defeated Drake in the rap battle.

Assessment of the broader context of the feud clarifies that “Not Like Us” relates to well-known controversies that Drake personally acknowledged and perpetuated, adds UMG, which notes the Toronto rapper invited Lamar to “talk about [him] liking young girls.” In “The Heart Part 6,” Drake affirmed that he understood Lamar’s statements to refer to his controversy with Millie Bobby Brown in which he was criticized for messages they exchanged when she was a minor.

UMG likens accusations made in diss tracks to statements in a letter to the editor, which are typically not considered defamatory since the common expectation of the platform is to serve as a vehicle for expressing an individual’s opinion. It points to the 1995 dismissal of a lawsuit from an individual who accused The New York Times of defamation over an article published in the opinion section accusing him of participating in a crime. The court held in that case that the “immediate context and broader social context” in which a statement was made should be considered in determining whether it conveys opinion or fact.

More recently, a federal judge sided with Barstool Sports that it couldn’t have defamed Michael Rapaport in a series of tweets, videos and blog posts accusing the actor of racism, stalking his ex-girlfriend and having herpes. U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald found that the disputed statements aren’t “actionable assertions of fact” because they were made amid a contentious feud in which audiences understood they’d hear opinionated assertions.

UMG also claims protection under the standard for defamation in which it must be found that the allegedly libelous statements were made with knowledge they were false or reckless indifference to their truth. For cases relating to works of fiction, parody and satire, courts recognize that the examination must focus on what the publisher intended to convey, the company says. “There is no basis for a claim that any person at UMG had the subjective intent to publish false factual statements about Drake; UMG released a rap diss track, conveying fiery rhetoric and insults—not factual assessments, much less false ones,” writes Rollin Ransom, a lawyer for the company, in the filing. The label says it engaged in the same conduct when it distributed “Family Matters,” in which Drake accuses Lamar of domestic abuse and is not the father to his son.

Days after Lamar released what ended up as the penultimate song in the rap battle, Drake’s security guard was shot outside his Toronto home. Drake alleged that Lamar issued a “call to violence” against him in a way that constitutes harassment.

To attempt to have the case thrown out, UMG presents various legal points, one being that Drake doesn’t have the right to bring a civil lawsuit over an alleged breach of a criminal law. Nevertheless, they argue that the dramatic and figurative language Drake finds objectionable is common in rap diss tracks.

Among the thrusts of Drake’s lawsuit was his belief that UMG intended to “devalue” his music and brand in order to gain leverage in negotiations. He alleged that the company covertly paid third parties to play, stream and promote “Not Like Us,” citing an anonymous individual who said in a Twitch stream that Interscope, Lamar’s label, used bots to get to 30 million streams on Spotify in the initial days following the release of the song. In response, UMG says that Drake hasn’t sufficiently supported arguments that it engaged in a pay-for-play scheme.

Earlier this month, the court denied UMG’s bid to pause discovery in the case. The order was issued a day after Drake moved for permission in Texas state court to depose a company representative and the production of certain documents relating to whether the label was actually a clearinghouse for promoting the track or actively schemed to promote it by covertly paying radio stations.

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2025-03-17 23:57