FRIENDS AGAIN: Sinead O’Connor, who was given...

FRIENDS AGAIN: Sinead O’Connor, who was given a warm welcome as a guest vocalist on the just-concluded WOMAD tour, has nearly completed a new album of original songs that could be released early next year, but no tour plans have been made.

The singer, booed off the stage at the Bob Dylan tribute concert in New York last year, had reportedly been nervous about facing U.S. crowds again but her frisky stage manner suggested she felt comfortable on the tour.

But O’Connor still apparently wanted her privacy backstage. At the L.A.-area WOMAD stop at Cal State Dominguez Hills, she was spotted trying to bum a cigarette--thinly disguised in a shoulder-length red wig.