Yesterday saw a win for Drake in his ongoing defamation lawsuit (and cold war) against Universal Music Group over the allegations made in Kendrick Lamar’s Not Like Us. At a pre-trial conference, the judge denied Universal’s request to stay the discovery process (AKA to pause the exchange of information between parties), allowing Drake’s team to begin deposing (interviewing) executives and requesting access to documents, including Lamar’s contracts with the label. Following the hearing, Drake’s lawyer Michael Gottlieb told Variety, “Now it’s time to see what UMG was so desperately trying to hide.”
The suit, which was filed in January, accused Universal Music Group of defamation and harassment, alleging that the company (which also represents Drake) “approved, published and launched a campaign to create a viral hit out of a rap track” that was “intended to convey the specific, unmistakable, and false factual allegation that Drake is a criminal paedophile, and to suggest that the public should resort to vigilante justice in response”.
Universal’s response, however, argued that Drake is merely suing because he “lost a rap battle”: “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.” They also argued that Drake’s case risks tempering diss tracks going forward. (Tbf, three years ago Drake signed a public petition criticizing “the trend of prosecutors using artists’ creative expression against them’ by treating rap lyrics as literal fact.”)
Overall, the case and the accusations (which are hearsay) are a very public microcosm of broader societal fears: of the implication that paedophilia is only enacted in elite circles and the right’s weaponizing of it during the Trump campaign. All of this has also been brought into sharp relief by the Diddy case and manosphere culture. Kendrick, then, has (intentionally or unintentionally) become the face of our widespread denunciation of such abuse.
