Violence against women became a verbal weapon in the feud between Kendrick Lamar and Drake last year. Drake called Lamar a woman abuser in "Family matters" and Lamar rapped about Drake being a sex offender on "Not like us" – the song that made people proclaim Kendrick the winner.
In rap feuds, grotesque exaggerations are part of the genre and during the feud, no evidence was presented. Drake – who will be playing at Avicii Arena in Stockholm on August 21 – is now using his lawyers to try to do just that.
In January 2025, Drake sued Universal Music Group – the record label that both he and Lamar have contracts with. Drake's lawyers claim that UMG heavily promoted "Not like us" to damage his reputation and pressure him into signing a contract that benefited the company. After the song was played at the Superbowl, Drake claimed that the performance also constituted defamation, something UMG called "absurd".
Bodyguard shot at home
After the success of "Not like us", Drake's residence in Toronto was subjected to three break-in attempts — one where his bodyguard was shot — and months of online harassment. According to the lawsuit, he took his son out of school for safety reasons, which is claimed to be a direct consequence of UMG's release of "Not like us".
On August 12, Drake's legal team submitted a new filing in the federal lawsuit. They are demanding documents "related to domestic violence, violence against women and/or other forms of violence committed by Kendrick Lamar Duckworth".
Drake seems to want to confirm the allegations in "Family matters", where he rapped that Lamar abused his wife.
The song also suggested that Lamar's children actually have manager Dave Free as their father. In the lawsuit, they have also requested access to all communication regarding the manager and Lamar's children.
Accuses CEO
Drake's lawyers also want to get access to Kendrick Lamar's UMG contract and claim that the company is protecting its CEO, who is allegedly "personally involved" in the marketing campaign for "Not like us".
A breakthrough came recently when Drake's team managed to get in touch with a key witness who is accused of using bots with UMG's subsidiary Interscope to artificially increase the spread of "Not like us".
UMG wants to get the case dismissed and claimed in March that Drake "lost a rap feud that he himself provoked and voluntarily participated in. Diss tracks are a popular and appreciated art form full of coarse insults, and it would suffer greatly if Drake's lawsuit is allowed to continue".
Sources: Billboard, XXL, NPR, The Guardian and others.
2013: In a guest appearance on Big Sean's song "Control", Los Angeles rapper Kendrick Lamar lists a number of rappers he "has love for but is trying to murder", including Canadian Drake. In an interview with Billboard, Drake responds with a dismissal: "I know very well that Lamar is not 'murdering' me, at all, on any platform". After that, diss tracks are exchanged on various songs over several years.
October 2023: Rapper J Cole releases "First person shooter" where he mentions the rap world's "Big three" (the three biggest) as himself, Drake, and Kendrick Lamar.
March 2024: Lamar responds with a guest appearance on Future's song "Like that" with the line "motherfuck the big three, it's just big me".
April 2024: Drake releases two songs in a row. "Push ups" – which, among other things, mocks Kendrick Lamar's height. Then "Taylor made freestyle" which uses AI voices from two of California's biggest rappers: 2Pac and Snoop Dogg to troll Los Angeles rapper Lamar. The song is removed from various platforms after Tupac Shakur's estate threatens with a lawsuit.
Kendrick Lamar responds with "Euphoria" which questions Drake's merits in the hip-hop world.
May 2024: 72 hours after "Euphoria", Lamar releases "6:16 in LA" which claims that Drake is an absent father, and that he has a "mole" in his organization OVO who sends sensitive information to Lamar.
14 hours later, Drake responds with "Family matters", which takes the feud to a private level. Drake questions Lamar's image as a "black savior" and suggests that Lamar is trying to clean up his image after abusing his wife.
Then it goes fast. Less than an hour after "Family matters", Lamar releases "Meet the Grahams". A song written in letter form addressed to Drake's family members, which, among other things, suggests that Drake is "hiding" a daughter, and is engaging in sex trafficking at his mansion in Toronto.
24 hours later, Lamar delivers the final blow with "Not like us" – which calls Drake a "colonizer" and contains the famous line "certified loverboy? certified pedophiles".
Drake's response "The Heart Pt. 6" is released but has no chance. The "beef" has a clear winner when "Not like us" tops the Billboard list and becomes a world hit.
June 2024: Lamar plays "Not like us" five times at a concert in Los Angeles where the song has become a praise to the American West Coast's hip-hop.
September 2024: Kendrick Lamar is announced as the Superbowl's halftime entertainment.
November 2024: Drake accuses the record label UMG and the streaming platform Spotify of using bots and so-called "pay-to-play" methods to give "Not like us" an unfair advantage on the streaming market.
January 2025: Drake sues UMG. The same month, "Not like us" reaches a billion streams on Spotify.
February 2025: Kendrick Lamar wins five Grammys and accepts the awards dressed in jeans from top to toe, something that is usually called a "Canadian tuxedo" – which is assumed to be a jab at Drake. A few days later, Lamar plays "Not like us" at the Superbowl.
