Veteran rapper Lord Finesse has filed a lawsuit against Mac Miller over the use of his 1995 track "Hip 2 Da Game," reports Courthouse News Service. The suit accuses Miller of lifting the track for his own 2010 cut "Kool Aid and Frozen Pizza," which appeared on his mixtape K.I.D.S. and became a breakout Internet hit for the then-rising rapper.
Finesse filed the lawsuit against Miller, his label Rostrum Records and mixtape website DatPiff.com, which released K.I.D.S. It alleges that the mixtape has been downloaded more than 500,000 times and streamed more than 450,000 times.
"This is a case about a teenage rapper — Mac Miller — copying the music from a song written, produced and performed by Lord Finesse, a hip-hop legend, changing the title and then distributing it under his own name in order to launch his music career," the lawsuit reads.
In response, Miller defended himself on Twitter: "I made that record and video as nothing more than an 18-year-old kid who wanted to rhyme and pay homage, no other intentions," he wrote. "Finesse and I spoke on the phone for an hour after he heard the record and cleared the air. We even planned to work on music together."
Miller added that when he heard Finesse had taken issue with the song, he reached out only to receive no response. He also suggested that Finesse never cleared the Oscar Peterson sample originally used to craft "Hip 2 Da Game."
Finesse had his own retort, tweeting, "This case is about the overall picture . . . If you're just looking at 'one' point . . . It's about so much more #look deeper."
