John Legend thinks Kanye West is always looking to do to "boldest and most unexpected" things.
The ‘All of Me’ hitmaker famously locked horns with his old friend – who has four children with wife Kim Kardashian West – earlier this year over his support of President Donald Trump but he admires the ‘Famous’ rapper for pursing the interests he finds freeing.
Speaking about Kanye, John told the Observer magazine: "He wants to do what he thinks is the boldest, most unexpected and free thing.
"Obviously I vehemently disagreed with the turn it took when it came to Trump, but I think that’s a common thread when it comes to the creative and life choices he’s made."
John himself has been embroiled in controversy recently over his reworked version of ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ – which he wrote with Natasha Rothwell and recorded with Kelly Clarkson – and thinks the outcry is a "proxy war" in response to the #MeToo movement.
He explained: "It’s interesting, this whole backlash to the #MeToo movement.
"People thinking we’ve gone too far speaking up for a woman’s right to not get raped or sexually harassed, when some would argue we’ve not gone far enough, when we have an admitted sexual assailant in the highest office in the land.
"People think that because some people have lost their jobs, or have been expelled from Hollywood, like Weinstein, that we’ve gone too far. I don’t agree.
"But people wanted the ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ war to be a proxy war for all that."
The 40-year-old star – who has kids Luna, three, and Miles, 18 months, with wife Chrissy Teigen – insisted his version of the song wasn’t meant to be "preachy".
He said: "The song was supposed to be silly! It wasn’t supposed to be preachy at all. I never disparaged the old version. And, by the way, the original writer, or his family, gets paid for my version, too."
John Legend: Kanye West makes ‘bold’ choices
