DJ Akademiks reacted to Kendrick Lamar trolling Drake ahead of his performance of "Not Like Us" on the opening night of his Grand National Tour with SZA on Saturday night. To do so, Lamar played a pre-recorded skit of himself sitting down for a deposition. In the video, an attorney asks him, "Does this ring a bell? 'Drop, drop, drop, drop,'" before the diss track kicks off.
Akademiks began by admitting that Lamar should perform "Not Like Us" several times each night. He compared the situation to Travis Scott performing "Fein" multiple times a show as well as Kanye West and Jay-Z doing the same with "N****s in Paris."
"I'm calling everything fair. If this is part of the show, I don't think that's obsessed with Drake," Ak admitted. "I'm clowning you on tour gang. I'm not obsessed. The Super Bowl performance was obsessed. Him doing a full show and then getting to the climax, which is "Not Like Us," his biggest song ever. Yeah, he's supposed to clown Drake. I get it.
Drake UMG Lawsuit
With the deposition set-up, Kendrick Lamar appeared to be referencing Drake's decision to take legal action against Universal Music Group over "Not Like Us." He accused the company of defamation, alleging they artificially boosted the success of the song to devalue his brand.
Last week, he filed a huge amendment to his lawsuit, referencing Kendrick Lamar's performance at the Super Bowl, his wins at the Grammy Awards and more. He argued that the Super Bowl performance aimed to "assassinate" his character by introducing the "Not Like Us" to “millions of children” who had “never before heard the song or any of the songs that preceded it."
Universal Music Group put out a statement afterward, with an ominous warning for Drake. “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,” it began. At one point, the statement reads: "As the old saying goes, ‘be careful what you wish for.’"
