Dion Return Of The Wanderer/Fire In The Night CD - Import

Both of these albums, from 1978 and 1979, respectively, were made with the Streetheart Band, Dion's then-touring outfit. FIRE went unreleased at the time for reasons unaddressed in the CD's liner notes (there aren't any).

Stylistically, the two are pretty much of a piece, although RETURN has a bit of a '70s West Coast studio rock-lite sound (think Linda Ronstadt or the Eagles), while FIRE has mild funk touches and in general attempts to rock out a little more. RETURN has stronger material, by and large; there are excellent covers of Tom Waits' "Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night," and Bob Dylan's "Spanish Harlem Incident," both of which suit Dion's jazz-inflected vocals to a tee, while his own "I Used to Be a Brooklyn Dodger" is as fine an ode to a vanished era as you could wish.

Between 1978 and theYo Frankie album, Dion Di Mucci abandoned secular music completely and cut nothing but gospel material for 10 years. His swansong in '78 was the album Return Of The Wanderer - this features his band the Streethearts. His last gospel album was cut in 1979 using much the same band and Cashman & West, the same production team but remained unreleased until this.

2 LPs on 1 CD.

Recorded at Bayshore Recording Studios, Miami, Florida and The Hit Factory, New York in 1978.

Personnel: Dion DiMucci (vocals, acoustic & electric guitars), Tommy West (acoustic guitar, background vocals), Rusty Steele (guitar, background vocals), Lee Foy (saxophone, flute, harmonica, background vocals), Mark Tiernan (keyboards, background vocals), Jon Cobert (synthesizer), Danny Weston (bass), Jim Kestle (bass, background vocals), Buzz London (drums, percussion), Jimmy Maelen, Bruce Tergessen (percussion), Marty Nelson, Vivian Cherry (background vocals).

Compilation producer: Steve Hoffman.