Hootie and the Blowfish will release a new album and tour next year

IT’S NOT the 1990s, but it is time to bust out your cargo shorts, because Hootie and the Blow fish have reunited.

The band, which first hit it big almost 25 years ago with “Cracked Rear View,” announced on Monday that it will release a new album and go on tour next year.

“We’re writing songs in the studio, and we’re making a new album,” lead singer Darius Rucker said on the “Today” show on Monday. “For us, making a record is fun, but we’re not doing it for us. We’re doing it for those people who used to plan their vacations around a Hootie and the Blowfish tour.”

Yes, people used to do that! Never mind the jokes about the band name and their aggressively mainstream sound, because it’s hard to understate how much of a musical phenomenon the group was at its peak, with their signature catchy melodies and joyful harmonies.

“Cracked Rear View” remains one of the highest-selling albums of all time, according to the Recording Industry Association of America, as it went platinum

For us, making a record is fun, but we’re not doing it for us. We’re doing it for those people who used to plan their vacations around a Hootie and the Blowfish tour. Darius Rucker, lead singer

21 times and spent eight weeks on top of the Billboard 200 chart. The band won two Grammys, including best new artiste and best group pop performance for “Let Her Cry.”

Their follow-up,” Fairweather Johnson,” also hit No. 1, and they’ve cut three more albums since, but they’ve never repeated the success of their major label debut.

The band officially went dormant in 2008. “We felt like going away for a while, getting back to our families and a little bit more of a sedentary lifestyle might be a good experiment,” band member Jim Sonefeld told the Associated Press. “We didn’t say we were going away for six months or six years. We just said, ‘Let’s go dormant.’”