Oh boy: Boy George at the RS Lounge nightclub in London today. The Culture Club singer will be performing for the sanitation workers he worked with while he was doing community service

Boy George is returning to the streets of New York - to play a concert for sanitation workers he did community service with two years ago.

The eighties pop star unveiled plans to perform at a free private gig at the Department of Sanitation's Family Day in August.

The singer spent a week sweeping streets in the Big Apple in August 2006 after pleading guilty to falsely reporting a burglary at his lower Manhattan apartment. The police officers who responded found cocaine.

The 46-year-old former Culture Club star, real name George O'Dowd, will appear  at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn on August 17, where he will perform a full set of his songs in front of about 5,000 people.

"He conveyed to us that he sees the difficulty in the job that Sanitation does on a daily basis - this is just a way of him showing appreciation for New York's Strongest," said Department of Sanitation spokesman Keith Mellis.

A spokesman for George said he had stayed friendly with members of the department.
The singer said in a statement:

"The people I worked alongside showed great kindness to me at a very difficult time and I wanted to thank them all in a way that would show my appreciation."

Boy on the street : Boy George during his five days of community service cleaning the streets of lower Manhattan

He is also playing gigs in Westbury, Long Island on August 5 and Terminal 5 in Manhattan on August 14, where tickets are priced at $35 USD, according to the New York Post newspaper.

He was recently spotted selling T-shirts at a London market to make ends meet - despite selling more than 10 million records in the 1980s.