(Cover) - EN Showbiz - R. Kelly says his recent surgery was a "scary" experience even though it made him feel better.

R. Kelly had an operation in July for a malignant abscess that grew on one of his tonsils. The 44-year-old R&B singer is now fully recovered but he admits going under the knife terrifying.

"It was really scary," R. Kelly told MTV News. "At the end of the Love Letter Tour, towards the end, I started feeling it. I thought I had a cold, but, man, I had like a cyst as big as a golf ball on my tonsils. The doctors though, they cut it out, they took care of me really good."

Although he has been recuperating from the procedure, R. Kelly has not been inactive professionally. He has been working on his upcoming album Black Panties and it is now near completion. The singer believes the record hearkens back to one of his greatest works in the past, 12 Play, the 1993 LP that propelled him into superstardom.

"I just did the whole Love Letter joint and everybody thinking, 'Oh that's the direction he's goin' now,'" R. Kelly said on the Morning Riot radio show in Chicago on Thursday. "Nah, that was a moment in time, just like Ignition and Bump n' Grind and all this stuff was a moment in time. Now this Black Panties album... it's the new 12 Play."

R. Kelly's eleventh solo record Black Panties is slated for an early 2012 release. (C) Cover Media