Source: Tim Mosenfelder / Getty
A birthday party for 21 Savage has landed him in some legal trouble, causing the rapper to respond to a lawsuit filed by the holders of the FreakNik trademark against him.
21 Savage held his 29th birthday party last Friday (October 22) at a club in Atlanta, Georgia, which was dubbed “FreakNik 21.” After 9 Partners, the company that owns the rights to the FreakNik name, took to Twitter on Monday, October 25th to note the event by showing a clip of it and their intent to sue the “Knife Talk” rapper and his co-manager, Meezy, for not giving them credit.
“Saw @21savage and @megameezy #Freaknik21 last night at @underground_atlanta and looked like a super dope event. Sucks we gonna have to sue them when all we asked that they acknowledged us since it was a free event and they declined,” the tweet read.
A follow-up tweet stated: “Spending over a million to revive a brand, fighting negative public perception and proving we can do it 2 years with no issues, comes at a cost. We can’t let others just infringe on that. So know when you hear them talk about we tried to work it out very easily beforehand.”
The group then posted the actual legal filing on their Instagram account, clarifying that they talked to Meezy to try to straighten things out before the party but were rebuffed as well as mentioning other events held by Saweetie and Quavo that also used the FreakNik name.
“We said we will give you [the trademark] license for FREE and was gonna ask to make sure it has a nonprofit presence there. They said no… I didn’t want this smoke,” they wrote. “Again we said, ‘Man, put on for the city. Just acknowledge us and we will give you the license FREE.’ Meezy said he would just change the name. He didn’t.”
21 Savage succinctly addressed those comments through his own Twitter account saying, “Y’all better go sit down somewhere.”
Meezy also responded through Twitter, stating: “I’m from ATL I know what Freaknik really suppose to be at heart, and it wasn’t about charging people it was about a vibe and that FREE vibe brought money into the city for everyone…”