His solo career issued Furey with a new creative licence to work with other musicians and songwriters in a way that he had never done before. “I had this great freedom; for the first time, I could actually fly,” he nods. His 2012 album Colours, for example, saw him sing with pop star-turned-actor Shayne Ward and Mary Black, while his appearance on RTÉ TV show “The Hit” in 2013 injected new life into his career after he won the show with the Gerry Fleming-written The Last Great Love Song, which went to number one in the Irish charts.