Cee Lo Green upset John Lennon fans on Saturday night by performing a soulful version of the songwriter's classic "Imagine" with the lyrics changed from "nothing to kill or die for / and no religion too" to "nothing to kill or die for / and all religion's true." According to some fans, Green changed the meaning of the song by switching out the line...
Green, who sang the song on NBC's New Year's Eve broadcast from Times Square, responded to criticism about the alteration by tweeting "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."
09 January 2012
Changing the lyrics of iconic music
This link is left over from the New Year's holidays, as reported by Rolling Stone:
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He may have meant no disrespect, but he certainly gave it.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm not a particularly religious person.
It's great how he has managed to offend atheists who identified with the old lyrics and just about every devout religious believer (except, perhaps, for universalists).
ReplyDeleteCLO, and others, are just preparing you for the entrance of the "Cosmic Christ" - didn't you know??
ReplyDeleteSo he changed the meaning. So what? He used artistic license to make it more meaningful to him personally. It's not like he bought the rights to the song and said "all people must use these lyrics now".
ReplyDeleteI agree with Lady. I LOVE the orignal and it's message. But Ceelo put his own spin on it (sorta thought that was the point of a cover). The orignal remains intact. I think it's fun. Sorta think John Lennon would agree.
ReplyDeleteFrom the two examples in the post (his change and his tweet), I don't see how someone with such poor linguistic skill can make the assessment of what lines in a song mean.
ReplyDeleteHe didn't use 'artistic licence'.
ReplyDeleteHe was completely trampling over the meaning of the lyrics. That's just chickenshit, and his justification is lame, lame, lame.
If he wanted to sing a religious song he should have picked a religious song.
He was giving a universalist counterargument to the original atheist message of the song. Had he picked an already religious song, it would have been a stand-alone statement and less powerful (I doubt he has the skill to give a powerful message on his own).
ReplyDeleteI hope those who are upset about this have the same opinion about every other imitation art piece [on serious subjects] that was changed to have a vastly different effect than the original.
Whatever his intention, it was a clumsy attempt. One needn't "imagine" that all religion is true: it's everywhere all the time. May as well sing "Imagine there's a heaven
ReplyDeleteIt's easy if you try."
Weak.
Personally, I think it was blasphemy. If Lennon were alive, he'd probably sue and should win.
ReplyDeleteSince so many people have been killed in the name of religion, changing the lyrics completely changes the meaning of the song. I agree with Barbwire -- or I really believe that Lennon would not have sold the rights to the song. It's not like Yoko cared or currently cares what happens to John's music...
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