After announcing her retirement from music in 2003, Sinead O’Connor will return this fall with a new album, “Throw Down Your Arms.” As previously reported, the 12-track set features covers of reggae material originally penned by Burning Spear, Lee “Scratch” Perry and Peter Tosh, among others. It was produced by Sly & Robbie at Tuff Gong Studios in Kingston, Jamaica.

Says O’Connor of the album, which will be released Oct. 4 via her own That’s Why There’s Chocolate And Vanilla imprint via Handleman, “The originals of these songs could never be bettered, and so all I can hope in recording them, is to honor the composers, and pass on their teachings, in the hope that doing so will carry the message of Rastafarai to some who might otherwise not know that God and religion are two very different things.”

O’Connor and Burning Spear performed several of the tracks in April at the Jammy Awards in New York, marking her first live appearance in the city in more than five years.

O’Connor will tour in support of the new album in November, including a two-show stand at New York’s Webster Hall.

Here is the track list for “Throw Down Your Arms”:

“Jah Nuh Dead”
“Marcus Garvey”
“Door Peep”
“He Prayed”
“Curly Locks”
“Vampire”
“Y Mas Gan”
“Prophet Has Arise”
“Downpressor Man”
“Throw Down Your Arms”
“Untold Stories”
“War”

By Jonathan Cohen, N.Y.