Drake has filed a massive 107-page amendment to his lawsuit against Universal Music Group, using Kendrick Lamar's performance at the Super Bowl Halftime Show as an example to further argue the defamatory nature of the diss track "Not Like Us."
Drake's legal team notes that the NFL decided to censor the word “pedophile” during the television broadcast. They suggest that this shows both the league and UMG recognized the lyric as defamatory.
The new amendment adds that the wildly popular event introduced “Not Like Us” to “millions of children” who 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.”
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"Not Like Us" Grammy Awards
The filing also notes that "Not Like Us" was a hit at the Grammy Awards, helping Kendrick Lamar win Record of the Year and Song of the Year. They claim that the crowd sang the lyrics during the telecast, but the Grammys’ YouTube page cut that when they uploaded clips from the ceremony.
Explaining the decision to file the amendment, his team said in a statement caught by HipHopDX: “Drake’s amended complaint makes an already strong case stronger. UMG’s PR ‘spin’ and failed efforts to avoid discovery cannot suppress the facts and the truth. With discovery now moving forward, Drake will expose the evidence of UMG’s misconduct, and UMG will be held accountable for the consequences of its ill-conceived decisions.”
Universal Music Group has already responded with a statement of its own. “Drake, unquestionably one of the world’s most accomplished artists and with whom we’ve enjoyed a 16-year successful relationship, is being misled by his legal representatives into taking one absurd legal step after another,” the company said in a statement. “Both the Texas and New York proceedings are an affront to all artists and creative expression. Should his legal representatives senselessly keep the New York lawsuit alive, we will demonstrate that all remaining claims are without merit.”
UMG concluded: “It is shameful that these foolish and frivolous legal theatrics continue. They are reputationally and financially costly to Drake and have no chance of success.”
