Rap veteran Heavy D came out of the New York scene in the mid-'80s, finding fame for such hits as 'Now That we Found Love' and 'Got me Waiting,' as well as rapping on Michael Jackson's 'Jam' and doing the theme to the hit show 'In Living Color.' But the MC was actually born in Jamaica, home of reggae. And now Heavy is embracing the music of his birth land.

"I have a brand new reggae album coming out Sept. 30 called 'Vibes.' And it's just me going back to my roots, my birthright," he tells the Boombox. "I went back into the '60s and '70s without a lot of the ska kind of feel and just [got] that rawness with the drums and the beautiful imperfections I like to call them, just where people get in a room and you have five dollars to make your album and that was it. I reached out to a lot of wonderful musicians and I think we came out with something extremely special."

Having concentrated on his acting in recent years, 'Vibes' marks his first new studio album in nearly a decade. Why return with this album now? "It's just something I've been working on for quite some time, four or five years at least," he says. "I felt I got it to a place where it wouldn't be any better than it is."

Given his pride in 'Vibes,' he is looking forward to sharing it live. "Yes you will [see me on the road], in a big way, with a band and everything," he says. "That's what I'm excited about, being able to perform with a band."

There are a lot of great reggae fests around the world, but if he got to do his own with this album, he tells the BoomBox, it'd be a pretty amazing lineup. "If I could open up for the dream gig it would be Sting, Sade, UB40, and myself, cause that's kind of what this album represents, that level of reggae," he says. "And god bless Bob Marley."