Tupac Shakur’s estate has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Drake over his use of an AI-generated imitation of Tupac’s voice in a new song, calling it “a blatant abuse of the legacy of one of the greatest hip-hop artists of all time.”
In a letter obtained by USA TODAY Wednesday, the estate of Tupac and his mother, Afeni Shakur, says it’s “deeply dismayed and disappointed by your unauthorized use of Tupac’s voice and personality in the ‘Taylor Made (Freestyle)’ record.”
The letter continues, “We demand that you immediately cease and desist from any further publication and exploitation of the Record, and that you immediately take ALL NECESSARY steps to remove it from all platforms where it is publicly available.”
The release is “a flagrant violation of Tupac’s publicity and the Estate’s legal rights. … The Estate would never have given its approval for this use,” the letter states. “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.”
USA TODAY has reached out to Drake’s representatives for comment.
Drake released the song, a follow-up diss track aimed at former collaborator Kendrick Lamar, on Instagram on Friday. “While we wait on you I guess,” Drake captioned the clip, seemingly alluding to Lamar’s lack of response to Drake’s leaked “Push Ups” diss track.
“Kendrick, we need ya, the West Coast savior/ Engraving your name in some hip-hop history,” the Tupac sound-alike raps in “Taylor Made.” “If you deal with this viciously/ You seem a little nervous about all the publicity.”
In “Like That,” off Future and Metro Boomin’s “We Don’t Trust You” album that released in March, Lamar, who’s featured on the track, reignited his and Drake’s feud by seemingly taking aim at the Canadian rapper with references to his song “First Person Shooter” and the record it’s on, “For All the Dogs.”
Drake ‘created the false impression’ that Tupac’s estate endorses his lyrics, lawyer says
Drake’s song “created the false impression that the Estate and Tupac promote or endorse the lyrics for the sound-alike, and the Record has adversely affected the market for (Amaru Entertainment, Inc.’s) own AI projects,” the letter claims.
The estate’s letter also encourages Drake to consider “the harm that unauthorized AI impersonations can cause to artists, including yourself.”
Another legal development: Drake dismissed from Astroworld lawsuit following deadly 2021 music festival
The Shakurs’ estate demands that Drake send written confirmation that “Taylor Made” has been removed from all platforms by Thursday afternoon as well as an explanation for “how the sound-alike was created and the persons or company that created it, including all recordings and other data ‘scraped’ or used.”
Lamar incorporated Tupac’s voice in “Mortal Man,” the closer in his Grammy-winning “To Pimp a Butterfly” album released in 2015. In the song, Lamar includes audio snippets of Tupac’s 1994 interview with journalist Mats Nileskär, making it sound as if he’s in conversation with the late rapper.
Snoop Dogg appears to respond to his voice being featured in Drake’s ‘Taylor Made’
“Taylor Made” also includes a recreation of Snoop Dogg’s voice.
Snoop appeared to address this in a video he shared on Instagram the next day. “They did what? When? How? Are you sure?” he wrote. “Why everybody calling my phone, blowing me up?”
He captioned the video with various emojis, including a shrugging person, a microphone and a robot head.
