Cee Lo Green Sparks Controversy by Altering Lyrics to "Imagine"

BY Alex HudsonPublished Jan 2, 2012

John Lennon's "Imagine" is one of the most widely-covered pop rock songs of all time, but Gnarles Barkley frontman Cee Lo Green still found a way to piss everyone off when he performed a version during NBC's New Year's Eve broadcast from Times Square.

Fans were angered when the singer changed a key lyric of the song, altering the line "No religion too" to say "All religion is true." This, of course, flips the song's religious message on its head, and this didn't sit well with many listeners.

As Rolling Stone and The Huffington Post point out, some fans called out the singer on Twitter, insulting the tweaked lyrics. He responded by writing "Yo I meant no disrespect by changing the lyric guys! I was trying to say a world were u could believe what u wanted that's all," and even tweeted directly at some of his detractors. These tweets have since all been deleted and only a generic "Happy new year everyone!!!!!!" message is left.

Watch the controversial performance below. The song begins at 3:53.

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