Bruce on the artist
"Alright, we try to play one song that we’ve never ever played before ….. we are challenged here, let me see if we get there…did he get it?...I don’t see it…(sings to himself)…we’re gonna figure it, this is, this is how it goes ….. Steve Van Zandt! stumped, huh? so somebody thinks they’re gonna stump the E Street Band (fakes laughter) not on my watch, alright, here we go…maybe I’ll do the verse myself (sings to himself)…alright, alright, here we go…we have never played it before…but we’re gonna play it in Iowa"
Dion and Bruce on "The Wanderer":
"At its roots, it's more than meets the eye. "The Wanderer" is black music filtered through an Italian neighborhood that comes out with an attitude. It's my perception of a lot of songs like "
I'm A Man" by Bo Diddleyor "
Hoochie Coochie Man" by Muddy Waters. But you know, "The Wanderer" is really a sad song. A lot of guys don't understand that. Bruce Springsteen was the only guy who accurately expressed what that song was about. It's "I roam from town to town and go through life without a care, I'm as happy as a clown with my two fists of iron, but I'm going nowhere." In the fifties, you didn't get that dark. It sounds like a lot of fun but it's about going nowhere."
Bruce Springsteen first met Dion DiMucci in October 1975 while visiting a Spector-Dion recording session in Los Angeles. However Steve Van Zandt, while touring as a member of the backing band for fifties vocal group The Dovells, had actually played guitar in Dion's backing band at a show in Miami, FL, on 31 Dec 1972. That trip, according to Van Zandt, is the original source of his nickname "Miami" Steve. On 30 Sep 1976, Springsteen and Van Zandt made an unannounced guest appearance during an encore at Dion's second (late) show at The Roxy Theatre in West Hollywood, CA. They provided backing vocals on Dion's "The wanderer". Dion introduced the pair as "honorary Belmonts". Since then, Dion and Springsteen have shared the stage on several occasions. They have performed together Dion's "
A Teenager in love" and "The wanderer", Springsteen's "
If I should fall behind", and Steven Van Zandt's "
I Don't want to go home" Springsteen described Dion as "the link between Sinatra and rock 'n' roll." Dion recorded and released two Springsteen songs : "
If I should fall behind" in 1992 and "
Book of dreams" in 2000.
Lyrics
(There's angels all around)
(There's angels all around)
(There's angels all around)
Do you walk the streets at night
Try to stay beneath the light
Do you sense it as you go
Maybe you are not alone
An angel walks, an angel prays
Here by your side at night unseen in the alleyways
Who guides the hand that comes to play
Like BB King and Stevie Ray
Who takes the pain we didn't choose
Turns it into Chicago Blues
An angel walks, an angel prays
By your side at night down through the alleyways, oh-ho-hu
A junkie cries (yeah yeah) and no one hears (yeah yeah)
A spirit flies (yeah yeah) to dry his tears (yeah yeah)
The bottle owns (yeah yeah) another man (yeah yeah)
Until he takes (yeah yeah) the helping hand (yeah yeah)
A spirit walks, an angel prays
By your side at night unseen through the alleyways
Who knows the spirit who walks beside
To light and guard, to rule and guide
They walk with Peter, they walk with Paul
Wrestled with Jacob and with us all
An angel walks, an angel prays
By your side at night down through the alleyways
Now there's angels all around, I know, don't you
Angels all around, I know, don't you
Times when you can't find the word
It comes to you as if you heard
Someone's voice from long ago
Tells you what you need to know
An angel walks, oh prays
By your side at night, child, down in the alleyways
Well now there's angels all around, I know, don't you
There's angels all around, I know, don't you
(Angels all around)
(Angels all around)
(There's angels all around)
(There's angels all around)
(There's angels all around)
(There's angels all around)