As I mentioned the other day, the “Tips For The New Year” business has become something of a self-perpetuating industry now. But it occurred to me over the weekend that another journalistic phenomenon is on the rise at this time of year: who’s going to reunite in, say, 2009?

Already, there’s a lot of gossip zinging about with regard to Blur, who’ve outed themselves to a degree, and about Guns N’Roses and The Smiths; two projects curiously twinned, as it happens, since Axl Rose and Morrissey are both now handled by Irving Azoff’s management company, which has an enviable track record of pulling off these things.

But my thinking was prompted by this BBC interview with the promoter Rob Hallett. In it, he says, “I do have another reformation up my sleeve that I can’t talk about yet that is going to please a lot of people of a certain age. If you were a teenage boy in the pre-punk ’70s you’re going to be very excited. Outside of Led Zeppelin, this is probably the biggest reformation you can hope for.”

So who could it be? My first thoughts were of Black Sabbath and Deep Purple, but surely they’ve been active recently enough for a reunion to be less of a big deal. ELO crossed my mind, but maybe their biggest successes came when punk was notionally revolutionising the music scene. ELP, maybe? Slade?

I’m a bit stumped, to be honest, but heartily intrigued. “The announcement isn’t a million miles away,” says Hallett in the BBC interview. But in the interim, who do you think it might be? I’m sure there’s someone obvious that I’ve missed. . .