The Wanderer

Ernie Maresca, who had co-written Runaround Sue, first meant The Wanderer for another group, Nino and the Ebb Tides, who passed. Dion got it as the B-side of The Majestic, the song the record company had chosen for him, and radio disc jockeys turned the record over. It entered the US charts in December 1961 and rose to number two in early 1962, behind Gene Chandler's Duke of Earl. It reached number ten in the UK and number one in Australia. The Del-Satins sang uncredited backing vocals, with Bucky Pizzarelli and Johnny Falbo on guitars, Jerome Richardson and Buddy Lucas on saxophones, Milt Hinton on bass and Panama Francis on drums.

Dion described it as black music filtered through an Italian neighborhood that comes out with an attitude. He also said it is really a sad song, and that Bruce Springsteen was the one man who accurately expressed what it was about. Maresca's demo had the line with my two fists of iron and my bottle of beer. The change to but I'm going nowhere seems to have been at the record company's insistence. Rolling Stone ranks it at number 243 on its list of the 500 greatest songs, and the recording entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2017.