Drake says UMG used Kendrick Lamar Super Bowl show to defame him
Published in Entertainment News
NEW YORK — Drake filed an amended complaint in his defamation lawsuit against Universal Music Group Wednesday, accusing his label of intentionally trying “to assassinate” his character via its promotion of Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show, which featured his track, “Not Like Us.”
In the amended filing, decried by UMG as “absurd” and reviewed by the Daily News, 38-year-old Drake says the performance, which was viewed by more than 133 million, exposed the song to a wider audience, “including millions of children” who Drake’s team claims had “never before heard the song or any of the songs that preceded it.
“It was the first, and will hopefully be the last, Super Bowl halftime show orchestrated to assassinate the character of another artist,” reads the filing, which says the label knowingly negotiated and promoted the halftime show after Drake first sued UMG for defamation in January.
Central to Drake’s defamation claim is the Grammy-winning diss track’s lyric that accuses him of being a “certified pedophile,” as does the album art.
“Drake’s amended complaint makes an already strong case stronger. UMG’s PR ‘sin’ and failed efforts to avoid discovery cannot suppress the facts and the truth,” the rapper’s lead attorney, Michael Gottlieb, said in part of his statement to Variety.
Drake first leveled allegations of defamation against UMG in November, filing his lawsuit in New York in January, claiming the label “knew that the salacious allegations … were false” and “chose corporate greed over the safety and well-being of its artists.”
UMG, which last month filed a motion to dismiss the suit, said in part of its lengthy statement to Variety that it’s “enjoyed a 16-year successful relationship” with Drake, who “is being misled by his legal representatives into taking one absurd legal step after another.”
The “foolish and frivolous legal theatrics,” according to UMG, are Drake’s “misguided attempt to salve his wounds” after he “lost a rap battle.”
Pointing to a judge recently denying the label’s request to stay discovery, UMG said if Drake doesn’t drop the suit in its entirety, he’ll also “personally be subject to discovery.
“As the old saying goes, ‘be careful what you wish for,'” said UMG.
A hearing for the suit dismissal is scheduled for June 30.
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