Here is what Henry Adaso, a music critic for About.com, had to say about Drake’s Take Care last year:
A briefly entertaining, occasionally ponderous, sometimes lazy, sometimes brilliant, slow-rolling, rap-singy, bulls-eye missing, kitten-friendly, runway-ready, mega corny, lip-smacking, self-conscious, self-correcting, self-indulging, finely tuned, Houston infatuated, crowd pleasing, delightfully weird, emotionally raw, limp, wet, innocuous, cute, plush, brooding, musical, whimsical, exotic, pensive, V-necked, quasi-American, strutting, doting, cloying, safe alternative to sleeping pills. (Rating: 2.5 out of 5 Stars) (Via)
Nothing too scandalous there, and yet, all traces of the review have been erased from Google, which is where, SPOILER ALERT, websites receive much of their traffic. Adaso believes that this is because Universal Music Group, which owns Cash Money Records which owns Lil Wayne’s Young Money Records which released Take Care, flagged the review as violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Sigh.
On The Rap Up, Adaso wrote that last month, Universal Music Group filed a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) complaint demanding that Google remove the review due to “copyright infringement.” But wait, how can a little ol’ music review be considered a “production…intended to circumvent measures that control access to copyrighted works?” He even credited the album artwork! Here’s how, says Adaso:
Looking at the DMCA complaint closely, I noticed that the infringing links are primarily file sharing portals, torrents, etcetera. Makes sense to flag those links. So, there’s 19 file sharing links and three seemingly random review links. Two of those review links point to my Drake piece. The third review link on that DMCA notice points to the A.V. Club. Strange, seeing as they didn’t post any illegal stuff. In fact, they gave Take Care a glowing review.
Anyway, I kept digging. Finally, I found the connection between my page and the A.V. Club link. The comment sections of both sites contain links to Big Ghost’s Take Care review. Big Ghost, in his colorful and comedic fashion, destroyed Take Care, capping the hilarious smackdown with 1 out of 5 Zeus Slaps. His review also boasts 400+ comments. (Via)
It could just be a major coincidence that these two reviews were taken down (damn commenters!), though that seems unlikely. The music industry isn’t exactly known for its integrity, after all, and if Universal is trying to censor negative press, that’s truly f*cked up. For once, it’s not even Drake’s fault!
