Drake has withdrawn his petition against Spotify and Universal Music Group after accusing the entities of launching an illegal “scheme” to boost numbers for Kendrick Lamar’s hit diss track “Not Like Us.”
In a New York filing on Tuesday reviewed by Variety, Drake and his Frozen Moments company withdrew its order to show cause seeking pre-action disclosure and preservation of certain documents and communications from both companies. The court document explains that Drake met with representatives on Tuesday and Spotify, which had filed an opposition, had no objection to the withdrawal and discontinuance, while UMG, which hadn’t filed an opposition, reserved its position.
Drake made waves in Nov. 2024 when he first accused UMG — which distributes both his and Lamar’s music — of using bots and payola to juice the numbers for “Not Like Us,” a track that accuses Drake of pedophilia and cultural appropriation. The petition, which was not a full lawsuit but rather a “pre-action” move, claimed that UMG “engaged in conduct designed to artificially inflate the popularity of ‘Not Like Us’…including by licensing the song at drastically reduced rates to Spotify and using ‘bots’ to generate the false impression that the song was more popular than it was in reality.”
UMG shared a statement with Variety at the time, denouncing Drake’s accusations. “The suggestion that UMG would do anything to undermine any of its artists is offensive and untrue,” read the statement. “We employ the highest ethical practices in our marketing and promotional campaigns. No amount of contrived and absurd legal arguments in this pre-action submission can mask the fact that fans choose the music they want to hear.”
Spotify took their objection to court by filing opposition papers in late December. “Spotify has no economic incentive for users to stream ‘Not Like Us’ over any of Drake’s tracks,” a spokesperson said. “Only one of Spotify for Artists’ tools, Marquee, was purchased on behalf of the song, for €500 to promote the track in France. Marquee is a visual ad that is disclosed to users as a Sponsored Recommendation.”
The streaming platform also asserted that UMG and Spotify “have never had any arrangement in which UMG ‘charged Spotify licensing rates 30 percent lower than its usual licensing rates for ‘Not Like Us’ in exchange for Spotify affirmatively recommending [“Not Like Us”],’ including to users who are searching for other songs and artists.”
Drake’s legal team responded to Spotify’s filing in a statement shared with Variety: “It is not surprising that Spotify is trying to distance themselves from UMG’s allegedly manipulative practices to artificially inflate streaming numbers on behalf of one of its other artists. If Spotify and UMG have nothing to hide then they should be perfectly fine complying with this basic discovery request.”
All of this stemmed from a heated back-and-forth between Lamar and Drake that ignited after the former dropped a verse on Future and Metro Boomin’s “Like That” in March 2024. What followed was an epic battle between the two rappers, with diss tracks being released on Instagram and streaming services in the months that followed. It all came to a head in early May, when they dropped simultaneous songs aimed at one another followed by Lamar’s “Not Like Us.” That song ended up becoming the biggest hit out of the war of words and was one of the most ubiquitous tracks of the year.
