Drake'sclaiming UMG and others steered the masses towardKendrick Lamar's"Not Like Us" diss to spite him, but Apple Music is reporting fans couldn't get enough of the song ... so much so, it's their biggest song of the year!!!
Apple Music rolled out its Top Songs of 2024: Global and Replay recap on Tuesday and the verdict is in ... "Not Like Us" conquered their Global Daily Top 100 the moment it dropped in May, where it spent 6 weeks at the top.
Benson Boone's “Beautiful Things," Sabrina Carpenter’s "Espresso," Shaboozey’s "A Bar Song (Tipsy)" and Taylor Swift’s "Cruel Summer" rounded up the top 5.
Kendrick Lamar had SMH vibes forLil Wayne on his new "GNX" album and according to Joe Budden, the "Not Like Us" rapper made the situation more tense by leaving him on read!!!
Joe Budden Network
The bombshell rumor was made on the new episode of "The Joe Budden Podcast"... a little birdie told Joe that Wayne had hopped in the booth to respond to Kendrick's "wacced out murals" bars after phoning him up but never getting Kendrick to pick up.
Kendrick tackled Wayne's lack of Super Bowl love at the top of "GNX" ... "Used to bump 'Tha Carter III' / I held my Rollie chain proud / Irony, I think my hard work let Lil Wayne down" ... "Won the Super Bowl and Nas the only one congratulate me / All these n****s agitated, I'm just glad they showin' they faces / Quite frankly, plenty artists, but they outdated / Old-ass flows, tryna convince me that you they favorite."
Joe Budden has always had a complicated relationship with Drake on the Hip Hop front but isn't cutting him ANY slack for the lawsuit he's filed targeting Kendrick Lamar's "Not Like Us" -- Joe says Drake had it coming because he's a Grade A 💩!!!
On the latest episode of "The Joe Budden Podcast," the crew was analyzing the lawsuit from all angles when Joe couldn't contain his anger and unloaded on Drake.
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JB didn't mince his lyrical descriptions ... "Drake's a lying, manipulative, sack of s***" who sneaks behind his rap peers and dangles cash in their baby mother's faces!!!
Jalen Rose wasted no time letting the zingers fly on the "Inside the NBA" set ... cracking a joke about Drake's UMG lawsuit in his debut on the iconic show -- and his cohosts ate it up!!
The funny moment happened at halftime of the Lakers and Suns' NBA Cup matchup on Tuesday ... when Kendrick Lamar's new track, "tv off," started playing on the broadcast.
Just like K. Dot does on the song, Shaquille O'Neal immediately yelled out "Mustard!!!!!!" ... and Rose -- who was filling in for Kenny "The Jet" Smith -- made the quick quip.
Hot 97's Peter Rosenberg is heavily disappointed in Drake but even more so, can NOT believe he has a team advising him to make all the wrong moves in his opinion!!!
Rosenberg hopped on "TMZ Live" with Harvey and Charles on Tuesday shortly after Drake's defamation lawsuit for Kendrick Lamar's "Not Like Us" lyrics ... the unsavory parts about being a private pedo.
TMZ.com
The veteran radio jock is unsure if Kendrick will get his sex offender bars off during his Super Bowl halftime set next year but what he does feel is Drake's been listening to all the wrong people.
The Hip Hop podcast community is in absolute shambles in light of Drake's bombshell lawsuit targeting UMG and iHeartRadio for Kendrick Lamar's "Not Like Us" boom ... and Genius' Head of Artist Relations Rob Markman claims, Drake was playing shiesty behind the scenes himself!!!
Markman also hosts his independent "Not a Podcast" ... well, podcast and claimed on Tuesday that someone tied to Drake's camp contacted him at the height of the battle to "show The Boy some love" ... when the tides were turning against him.
The vet journalist says the OVO adjacents admitted he was unbiased and while they didn't offer money, offered to allow him whitelisted access to Drake's music to boost the quality of his videos -- an offer Rob says he declined in the name of hip hop credibility!!!
6:40 PM PT -- A spokesperson for Universal Music Group tells TMZ … "The suggestion that UMG would do anything to undermine any of its artists is offensive and untrue. 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."
Drake seems to think there's some shadiness behind Kendrick Lamar's monster hit, "Not Like Us" ... and he's filed legal docs to investigate how it got so big.
Of course, "Not Like Us" is the song that effectively ended the Kendrick and Drake beef ... because its popularity buried Drake -- but now, he's alleging Universal Music Group used bots and a payola scheme to pump up the song.
According to the docs, obtained by TMZ Hip Hop, Drake says an "inside source" told him UMG made "covert payments" to multiple platforms, including radio stations, to play and promote the hell outta "Not Like Us." Legally, that's known as payola, and it's prohibited by the FCC.
Drake is rejecting all the deposits Kendrick Lamar's surprise "GNX" album floated in his direction with his nose up high and calling make-believe on everything being said about him!!!
Over the weekend, Drake kept it close to the home base on popular Canadian live streamer xQc and let his thoughts be known after introducing himself … “You need facts to take me out; fairy tales won’t do it.”
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It’s a defiant double down … Drake previously echoed these thoughts on his final Kendrick diss “The Heart Pt. 6” back in May — a track that has since been retitled and remastered by Kendrick!!!
3:26 PM PT -- Snoop Dogg has admitted to Kendrick Lamar that it was indeed the edibles that caused him to even be halfway curious about Drake's "Taylor Made Freestyle" with the artificial Tupac Shakur.
K dot new album GNX 💥🔥🔥🔥🔥🎤🎤🎤🎤🎤 It was the edibles 🤦🏾 😆👊🏿 west west king 🔥🎶💫
Looks like it won't happen again ... Snoop gave Dot's "GNX" album a perfect 5-mic rating!!!
Kendrick Lamar called Drake's "Taylor Made Freestyle" a blatant disrespect of Tupac Shakur's legacy and is floored that Snoop Dogg even gave it the time of day!!!
On the opening record "wacced out murals" of his new "GNX" album, Kendrick shared his disappointment in BOTH Lil Wayne AND Snoop for their roles amid the 2024 Rap Wars.
Wayne went on a world tour complaining about missing out on headlining Super Bowl LIX in his New Orleans hometown and never publicly said he was happy for K. Dot.
Drake fired off his final shot at Kendrick Lamar during their rap battle in the form of "The Heart Pt. 6" -- a title hijacked from K. Dot's long-running series ... but the Compton MC is saying "aht aht aht" ... that storyline belongs to me!!!
On his surprise drop album "GNX," Kendrick conjured up his own "heart pt. 6" ... totally ignoring the slander heard on Drake's version, instead detailing his career origin story with Top Dawg Entertainment.
Kendrick's track bridges a sample of SWV's "Use Your Heart" and he shares Illmatic tales down memory lane ... such as ScHoolboy Q gradually learning to rap, and President Punch running their triangle offense better than Phil Jacksonever could.
He also took the blame for sabotaging the Black Hippy project -- the in-house supergroup he, Q, Ab-Soul and Jay Rock were supposed to launch, but their solo careers all took priority.
TMZ.com
We spoke to Rock about BH last year and he did say the ball was in Dot's court, so his "heart pt. 6" lyrics measure up.
TDE artist Ab-Soul Soul Burger sells less than 5k first week as it failed to chart on the Billboard 200 chart. It becomes his second consecutive album to fail to chart following HERBERT released in 2022. 📉📉📉 pic.twitter.com/sSDhcbMR2J
The union seems like a distant memory now ... DJ Akademiks is currently giving Ab-Soul crap for not hitting the Billboard 200 for his recent album, which Kendrick wasn't a part of.
Drake had pushed the issue that Kendrick's manager Dave Free was secretly his Eskimo bro, but Dave got nothing but praise on the newer "heart pt. 6" ... and will likely celebrate even further when the album hits No. 1 next week.
Kendrick Lamar just disrupted the hip hop game once again for 2024 -- with a surprise release of his new 12-track album "GNX" hot off the presses and straight to the DSPs!!!
On Friday, Kendrick popped out of nowhere, raining on pre-announced albums from artists such as Ice Cube and Blxst ... going lyrically crazy on the opening track "wacced out murals," which many feel is the final nail in Drake's coffin following the 2024 Rap Wars that apexed with "Not Like Us" earning tons of Grammy nominations.
On that same track, he references his upcoming Super Bowl halftime show gig ... and how all his hard work "let Lil Wayne down."
Metro Boomin says his participation against Drake in the 2024 Rap Wars stems from a personal issue with Champagne Papi that left him shaking his head!!!
The super producer was instrumental in the entire battle, literally. Metro crafted the “Like That” beat where Kendrick Lamar initially snapped on Drake … and later led the “BBL Drizzy” movement.
He regrets going on his anti-Drake spree earlier this year but after being called "lame" on "Family Matters," he had to drum up a vocal response, considering the fact he's not a rapper.
Future and Metro Boomin were named GQ's 2024 Hitmakers of the Year ... but Mr. Hendrix isn't completely satisfied.
If Kendrick Lamar, Drakeand J. Cole make up the "Big 3" of rap, how's he supposed to be called chopped liver and not take it as BEEF?!?
That was the question Future floated regarding his own No. 1 song "Like That," which Kendrick hijacked when he rapped, "Motherf*** the Big 3, n****, it's just big ME!!!"
Chrishell Stause is back on "Selling Sunset" ... this despite saying she'd only film with Nicole Young again if the show forked over some serious dough.
Sources connected to the show tell TMZ ... Chrishell and Nicole are currently filming season 9 of the hit house-selling show after Chrishell said publicly in September that she wouldn't come back to the show if Nicole returned.
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She later amended her statement ... saying in an interview she'd come back if the production team would "add a zero" to her check -- but, still it seemed unlikely the two would share the screen again.
Jake Paul had a massive victory over Mike Tyson on Friday night ... and he wasted no time once again trolling Conor McGregor for an MMA fight.
Jake beat Tyson by a unanimous decision after what many considered a lackluster bout ... and immediately turned his sights to CM ... reigniting the feud.
In his early Saturday message, Jake posted to X ... "Dear Conor, I know you told my team you would fight me at 170lbs. That’s never happening. But let’s run it in MMA. No weight class. Just like how it used to be done. But you won’t."
Shyne says Funkmaster Flex is a well-known hater and you don't have to take just his word alone ... he says ask Jay-Z or Nas directly, or any diehard Tupac Shakur fan!!!
TMZ Hip Hop caught up with Shyne amid his vigorous press run for his upcoming Hulu doc "The Honorable Shyne," and he thanked Flex for the free promotion -- despite everything he's saying has been lies!!!
Shyne tells us Flex's beef with those hip hop heavyweights throughout the years shows his true character.