2Pac‘s estate has given Drake an ultimatum regarding his “Taylor Made Freestyle” diss against Kendrick Lamar, which features the late rapper’s likeness in artificial-intelligence form.
On Wednesday (April 24), Billboard obtained and published a cease-and-desist letter from litigator Howard King to the Canadian superstar for using a computer-generated replica of the West Coast icon’s voice on his latest song. The Death Row Records legend’s family is threatening to “pursue all of its legal remedies” if he doesn’t pull down the track in question within 24 hours of receiving the notice.
“The Estate is deeply dismayed and disappointed by your unauthorized use of Tupac’s voice and personality,” the note reads. “Not only is the record a flagrant violation of Tupac’s publicity and the estate’s legal rights, it is also a blatant abuse of the legacy of one of the greatest hip-hop artists of all time. The Estate would never have given its approval for this use.
“The unauthorized, equally dismaying use of Tupac’s voice against Kendrick Lamar, a good friend to the Estate who has given nothing but respect to Tupac and his legacy publicly and privately, compounds the insult.”
It continues: “It is hard to believe that [2Pac’s record label]’s intellectual property was not scraped to create the fake Tupac AI on the Record. The [song] has generated well more than one million streams at this point and has been widely reported in the general national press and popular entertainment websites and publications. Without question, it is exponentially more serious and damaging than a picture of you with some other people on a low volume website.
“If you comply, the estate will consider whether an informal negotiation to resolve this matter makes sense. If you do not comply, our client has authorized this firm to pursue all of its legal remedies including, but not limited to, an action for violation of … the estate’s copyright, publicity and personality rights and the resulting damages, injunctive relief, and punitive damages and attorneys’ fees.”
To this point, Pac’s brother has also publicly reprimanded Drizzy for the AI assists. According to an article published by TMZ earlier this week, Mopreme Shakur thinks it was inappropriate for the 6 God to use his sibling to disrespect another rapper.
He reportedly feels that the “Hotline Bling” hitmaker should’ve gone one-on-one with K. Dot rather than resort to what he calls the “nuclear option.”
The joint in question was released by the 37-year-old across social-media platforms last week.
Whereas the authenticity of his first counterattack was under speculation for a while, “Taylor Made Freestyle” openly embraces artificial intelligence with features from the voices of 2Pac and Snoop Dogg to convey alternate perspectives via lyrics that Drake wrote.
After using the two legends’ viewpoints to press his adversary to drop a response, he references Taylor Swift‘s new album and TDE boss Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith with the bars: “But now we gotta wait a fucking week ’cause Taylor Swift is your new Top/ And if you ’bout to drop, she gotta approve/ This girl really ’bout to make you act like you not in a feud/ She tailor made your schedule with Ant, you out of the loop.”
Soon after the track went live, Akademiks revealed during a livestream that he received a text from the rapper that read: “Ak, you know I was trying to come off tour and relax. N-ggas done fucked up my whole feng shui. Now I gotta eat until this debate is done.”
Future, Metro Boomin and Kendrick Lamar dropped “Like That” in late March, on which the California native devotes his entire guest verse to taking shots at Drizzy and J. Cole.
The beef has since escalated a great deal, with Rick Ross, The Weeknd and A$AP Rocky joining the K.Dot’s side and Cole withdrawing from the beef after releasing a diss track of his own.