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J. Cole is firing back at the allegations Cam'ron made in his pricy lawsuit.
Back in October, Cam filed a legal complaint against Jermaine Cole, alleging that he had not received full compensation for their collaboration "Ready '24" from the 41-year-old rapper's Might Delete Later mixtape. The Harlem rapper claimed he only agreed to contribute a verse to Cole if he appeared on a future song or podcast episode. He also wanted final approval before the song dropped and credit as a co-writer and a performer. In his first response filed on Tuesday, February 10, Cole alleged that he never agreed to Cam's "unreasonable conditions."
“Plaintiff encouraged and blessed defendants’ use of his performance, as it was to his career benefit,” Cole’s attorney, Christine Lepera, wrote per Billboard. “It was only after the release of ‘Ready ‘24’ that he began to demand unreasonable conditions never agreed to by Cole, or an excessive fee inconsistent with industry standards for a featured performance, followed by the filing of this lawsuit without notice to publicly disparage Cole as leverage.”
Cole's attorney maintains that Cam'ron appeared on the song “voluntarily and without condition.” In his lawsuit, Cam claimed he asked Cole to jump on two prerecorded tracks in September 2022 after they worked on "Ready '24." Cole allegedly told him he'd rather link up in person to make the songs from scratch, but they never finalized their plans to meet in the studio. Cam didn't reach out to Cole again until July 2023.
Cam claimed he asked Cole to pull up to his sports talk show, It Is What It Is with Ma$e and Treasure Wilson. He said he stayed in contact with Cole leading up to the release of their collaboration and Might Delete Later, but "The Let Out" rapper repeatedly said he was too busy to appear on his show.
“Plaintiff asked Cole to appear on his podcast, and he and Cole discussed the possibility of Cole appearing on Plaintiff’s podcast, but no commitment was ever made by Cole to do so nor was there any agreement or condition related to ‘Ready ‘24’ to do so.”
Despite his alleged issues with reconnecting with J. Cole after their studio session, the rapper's attorney asserted that Cam never objected to the song's release. Cam'ron sued Cole and Universal Music Group for $500,000 in royalties and profits from the song. As of this report, Cam'ron has not responded to Cole's filing. However, he did open up about what led up to the lawsuit on his Talk With Flee podcast on REVOLT. Check out the episode below.