John Legend says it is “sad, sometimes shocking” to look now at his former collaborator Kanye West, who played an instrumental role in Legend’s musical breakthrough 20 years ago.

As we write this, Kanye West has successfully mined the latest deposit of the life-giving attention that appears to be the only thing that sustains him at this point, having released a song this week called “Heil Hitler.

John Legend witnessed Kanye West in his prime after the rapper signed his former friend to his GOOD Music label in 2004. The duo would go on to collaborate on some of Legend’s greatest musical pieces,