Blue have “no rules” any more.

The ‘All Rise’ hitmakers - comprising Simon Webbe, Lee Ryan, Duncan James and Antony Costa - went on hiatus in 2004 before reuniting in 2011 and have been working together sporadically since the release of their ‘Colours’ album in 2015 because they changed their approach to the group to allow for more flexibility so the individual members have the freedom to work on other projects with no resentment from the others.

Antony explained: “I think Blue has lasted so long because there has been a lot of love and respect, which you need. Whether it’s personal stuff or you wanna go off and do other stuff. And I think that’s why Blue has worked because we have been able to do go off and come back.

“And why can’t we do that? There’s no rules anymore.

“If in a year or two one of us says ‘Oh I’m off to go and do so and so’ then – good luck!

“We’ve always had each other’s back and supported each other in different areas of work then we can afford to come back and have a good time.

“We wanna enjoy it rather than just put songs and album and go through that demise. We don’t wanna go through a demise. We want to keep our enjoying ourselves.

“For our own mental state of health, we want to miss it. If we do go off and miss it, we wanna be able to come back and do more shows.”

The group have been out on tour in support of their album ‘Heart and Soul' – their first record in seven years – and admitted things are much more “boring” on the road than they used to be.

Antony exclusively told BANG Showbiz: “We’re literally doing the gig, getting on the bus, do the gig, sleep and get on the bus. It’s quite boring.

“All of our lives have changed dramatically. How Duncan has come out and stuff, we’ve all got families, we’ve all got kids and it’s all about providing and putting food on the table. We can’t be selfish anymore, we can’t be ‘Oh well I’m gonna have loads of parties.’ It ain’t about that anymore.

“It’s about working, it’s about doing our graft, learning our trade and looking after ourselves.”