Cee Lo Green started off 2012 on the wrong foot when he committed a major lyrical faux pas on New Year’s Eve. The singer covered John Lennon‘s beloved peace anthem ‘Imagine’ and when he tweaked the lyrics a bit, it sent Lennon fans into an outrage. Guess Cee Lo learned a valuable lesson: You don’t mess with the classics.

Cee Lo was performing on NBC’s New Year’s Eve special right before Lady Gaga pushed the button to drop the ball in Times Square. Green swapped the original lyric “Nothing to kill or die for / And no religion too” to “Nothing to kill or die for / And all religion’s true.”

It was a small creative liberty but it infuriated fans nonetheless, who felt that changing the lyrics to Lennon’s song is an unquestionable “no-no.” According to the Huffington Post, Green even tweeted following the lyric change, realizing he just committed a blasphemous action. He wrote, “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.” Fans weren’t having any of that and began to hammer him over Twitter. The exchanges have since been deleted from his feed.

You can watch Cee Lo’s performance below and listen for the lyrical change.

Watch Cee Lo Green Change the Lyrics to ‘Imagine’

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