The record label behind both artists is attempting to have Drake’s defamation lawsuit dismissed, claiming that the lyrics of Drake’s takedown of Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” which is now officially the most well-known rap diss ever, are just “a series of hyperbolic insults,” the standard language of any hip-hop feud.
The firm, known as UMG, filed a brief in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on Monday, offering its first significant response to the case filed in January on behalf of Drake, whose real name is Aubrey Drake Graham. Lamar’s song “intended to convey the specific, unmistakable, and false factual allegation that Drake is a criminal pedophile,” he said, accusing the label of defamation and harassment.
Among other personal jabs, “Not Like Us,” which was the focus of Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime show last month, earned five Grammy Awards, including song and record of the year. It also accuses Drake of loving young females.
UMG claims that Drake “sued his own record company in a misguided attempt to heal his wounds after losing a rap war that he initiated and in which he actively participated.” The company said that Drake had made “similarly incendiary attacks at Lamar” and that the context and tone of the back-and-forth made the defamation claim hard to establish. The label cited lyrics by both artists related to last year’s heavyweight battle in its petition.
“Diss tracks are a popular and celebrated artform centered around outrageous insults, and they would be severely chilled if Drake’s suit were permitted to proceed,” UMG stated in its filing, adding that the lawsuit “disregards the other Drake and Lamar diss tracks that surrounded ‘Not Like Us’ as well as the conventions of the diss track genre.”
Drake’s attorneys had claimed that “Not Like Us” was more than just a normal rap feud because the song’s accusations were presented as fact, such as by using a map of Drake’s house with sex offender markers superimposed on top, as its cover art. They also claimed that the song caused actual violence, pointing to a shooting at the house that wounded a security guard a few days after it was released.
