The first big reunion of 2008 is already official.

My Bloody Valentine

In a year that has seen the likes of the Police, Rage Against the Machine, and Jesus & Mary Chain reunite, seminal rock group My Bloody Valentine confirmed this week that it has reunited and unveiled a series of live dates in the UK.

MBV frontman Kevin Shields confirmed the reunion during a video interview with fellow artist Ian Svenonious for the VBS.tv show Soft Focus earlier this week.

According to Shields, the band is nearly finished with an album that first started in 1996, and is also working on "a little bit of new stuff." In addition, the band is putting together a compilation of material it recorded in 1993 and 1994.

Shields said there will be an album out before year's end but didn't elaborate on how it would be distributed and whether or not the band had inked a deal with a record label to help it do so. A new album would be the band's first since 1991's Loveless.

"It sounds like what we sounded like--different but not radically different," he said. "People will go, 'Yeah, it sounds like My Bloody Valentine.'"

The band has been reportedly weighing an offer to play in late April at the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival in Indio, California. In the meantime, it has lined up a series of summer shows in the UK.

The Dublin-based band will play three shows (June 20-22) at London's Roundhouse, two shows (June 28-29) at the Apollo in Manchester, England, and two shows (July 2-3) at Glasgow's Barrowlands.