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On Monday, the biggest rap beef in history entered a new (and very strange) phase. Drake started legal action against Universal Music Group (UMG) and Spotify, claiming they had conspired to “manipulate” Kendrick Lamar’s diss “Not Like Us” into its world-beating success. The methods, the document claims, include secret deals, bots, pay-to-play, and even intentional misguiding of Siri. (UMG, it should be noted, denies everything).
Then, the following day, a second filing, this time in Texas, became public. This one took aim additionally at iHeartRadio.
News of the filings (which are not lawsuits—more on that later) took over peoples’ timelines instantly. But there was some confusion as to what it all means. Now that the dust has settled a little, and the actual legal filings have been widely shared, here are our answers to your questions.
Is this a lawsuit?
No. What Drake filed are “pre-action” petitions, which are letters sent to the court before a lawsuit is filed, asking for certain information. In this case, what Drake wants is for the court to order UMG, Spotify, and iHeart to turn over some specific things he’s asking for, to have executives sit for depositions, and he also wants to make sure the companies don’t delete any other documents or messages that could turn out to be relevant to the case he wants to bring.
There is no requirement for Drake to file a lawsuit just because he’s doing this, even if the court gives him what he wants. But in order to strengthen his case, he lays out some specific directions about where the lawsuit will likely go, if he files it.
What is Drake claiming?
Drake’s main claim is that UMG, Spotify, and iHeart worked together to artificially boost the popularity of “Not Like Us.” How does that affect him? Well, aside from wounded pride, the main harm alleged is that streaming is a “zero-sum” game—every time a song is played, another one isn’t. So manipulating the system in favor of one person hurts everyone else. And, since Drake is the one bringing this action, he’s saying he was the person who suffered “economic harm,” as the petition puts it, since his music was among the material not being played.
Why would these companies do this?
Money, of course.
The New York petition takes great pains to detail the “symbiotic business relationship” between UMG and Spotify, which would both, it implies, benefit from a huge viral hit. So, the theory goes, they decided to force one to happen.
There’s a secondary theory in the document, too, in case you don’t like that one. Because of the way UMG’s bonuses are structured, it claims, executives get paid almost entirely for the performance of their part of the company rather than the entire company. So if you are, for example, Interscope CEO John Janick, you have a pretty good motivation to give Kendrick Lamar a huge hit, rather than an artist from a separate part of UMG—someone like, say, Drake, who has a deal with Republic Records.
How does Drake say these companies did this?
Five main ways.
First, through a secret deal. The petition claims that UMG agreed to charge Spotify 30% less than normal to license “Not Like Us.” In exchange, Spotify supposedly agreed to recommend the song to its users—even people who were searching for “other unrelated songs and artists.”
Second, through bots, to artificially inflate Spotify and YouTube plays in order to make the song appear more popular than it really was.
Third, to pay Apple to direct people using Siri to the song, even if they weren’t looking for it. Specifically, they mention the period in July when users could ask Siri to play Drake’s Certified Lover Boy album and it would instead play “Not Like Us.”
Fourth, by paying to get the song on the radio, via the little-understood world of independent radio consultants. This is what the Texas petition largely focuses on.
Fifth, by paying social media influencers to promote the song and talk about what a huge success it was.
Does he have any proof?
The short answer is, we don’t know at this point. The whole point of filing this petition is to get UMG and Spotify to turn over any information they might have that would prove any of these accusations. But the petition does give some hints.
To take each of the accusations one by one:
The secret deal
No evidence for this is given in the petition, beyond the generic legal phrase “upon information and belief.” However, the deal Drake describes, as Audiomack co-founder Brian Zisook pointed out, sounds a lot like something that has existed since 2020 and is available to a lot of artists, not just Kendrick Lamar—Spotify’s Discovery Mode. Discovery Mode, according to Billboard, “gives artists the chance to gain more algorithmic exposure on the platform—through Spotify Radio and autoplay—in exchange for a lower royalty rate.” Specifically, it’s a rate that artist managers have said is 30% lower, the amount Drake cites in his petition.
The use of bots
The one detail mentioned in the section about bots is a YouTube video called “Kendrick Lamar EXPOSED by DJ Akademiks and HACKER Epic for BOT streams.” It recounts and summarizes the time an anonymous “hacker” known only as “Epic” appeared on a DJ Akademiks stream and claimed he was paid to use bots to “jumpstart” the play count for “Not Like Us” on Spotify.
“They wanted me to do 30 million [plays] early,” Epic explained. “Which fed into the rest of the views, because obviously it was going to be a hit song either way.” He also shared with Ak what he said was proof of payment for $2,500 from the banking app Zelle. There was no independent verification offered, during Ak’s stream or elsewhere, of Epic’s claims.
Ak himself said that his source at Spotify told him that the bot claims were not true, and he was met with much criticism for platforming Epic in the first place. Part of what Drake is asking UMG for in his petition is information about Epic “and any additional streamers whom UMG paid.”
The use of Siri
Drake’s claim about Siri is backed up with a link to an article in Vibe. But that article contains a much more plausible explanation for the mixup than outright bribery (or even a backhanded prank by a Kendrick-loving employee). Siri takes song lyrics into account when figuring out what song someone is requesting. So saying “Siri, play ‘Certified lover boy’,” in a moment where “Not Like Us” is ubiquitous (and highly searched) seems likely to get you a song that has those words prominently in the lyrics, especially when Drake’s album is over three years old.
Radio tricks
The New York petition claims that Drizzy has “information from a third party” that someone from UMG paid an independent radio promoter, “who had agreed to transfer those payments to certain radio stations and/or radio station employees.”
That would be payola. But what is legal—and ubiquitous—is not that much different. Independent radio promoters effectively serve as gatekeepers, with their fees acting as a “toll” for artists to get their song major spins. And in the realm of things that are technically illegal but also common, money or goods passing from record labels to radio stations, using independent promoters as intermediaries, is common, as this 2019 Rolling Stone investigation shows.
However, some major radio conglomerates, including iHeart and Cumulus, do little to no business with independent promoters because of this very dynamic.
The Texas petition goes into a little more detail, specifically claiming that iHeartRadio was the recipient of payments from UMG.
The use of influencers
Drake’s main evidence on this claim so far is against one specific outlet: NFR Podcast. The petition says that Drake “understands”—notably a lower bar than the “obtained information from a third party” language he uses in the radio section—that UMG paid NFR Podcast to promote “Not Like Us” without telling people they were paid to do so.
There is no direct evidence for this in the petition—only mention of several breathless messages on NFR Podcast’s X account about “Not Like Us,” including one that was shared by Interscope Records, Lamar’s label and a part of UMG.
With that said, websites and influencers promoting products for money without disclosing it is of course a big problem. It’s especially bad on TikTok, as Vox revealed in this excellent 2022 piece.
Is Drake making any other big accusations?
The other major claim that is making headlines is that UMG is attempting to cover up its shady actions. As a part of that cover-up, Drake claims that the company has fired “employees associated with or perceived as having loyalty to Drake.”
What does this have to do with the beef?
The Texas petition gets into the actual content of “Not Like Us” in a way the New York one almost entirely avoids. Drake says that UMG was aware that Kendrick’s song made false allegations about him.
“UMG … could have refused to release or distribute the song or required the offending material to be edited and/or removed,” it reads. “But…UMG designed, financed and then executed a plan to turn ‘Not Like Us’ into a viral mega-hit with the intent of using the spectacle of harm to Drake and his businesses to drive consumer hysteria and, of course, massive revenues.”
So what’s next?
As mentioned, Drake isn’t required to file a lawsuit just because he’s dropped these petitions. However, he does mention two potential directions a suit may go—directions that are not mutually exclusive.
First, he may bring a RICO case. A civil one, meaning no Young Thug-style jail time will be in the offing for anyone; only money will be at stake. But still, Drizzy says he has enough evidence of “wire fraud, mail fraud, and/or bribery” to prove that UMG violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act—but he needs to find out who all those alleged payments went to in order to figure out who else to bring in to the suit.
Second, the Texas petition brings up the possibility of a defamation case against UMG based on the content of “Not Like Us.”
Third, he’s saying that exaggerating the success of “Not Like Us,” if that’s indeed what the companies did, violates laws against deceptive business practices, fraud, and false advertising, so he’s going to go after them for that—and for the harm they’ve done to consumers.
But before any of that, a judge has to rule whether UMG and Spotify have to give Drake the information he wants.
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