Back In The Village by Iron Maiden

Album: Powerslave (1984)

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"Back In The Village" is one of Iron Maiden's musical adaptations of the old BBC television series, The Prisoner. "The Village" was the name of the prison in this Patrick McGoohan series.
Layered over the line "I see sixes all the way" is a whisper, which is apparently singer Bruce Dickinson saying the number 666. It is a reference to the first album that featured Dickinson on vocals, The Number of the Beast.
Bruce Dickinson, a licensed pilot and airplane aficionado, inserted some aviation terminology in here (he did the same in "Aces High" and "Tailgunner"). For example: "Take your chances, kill the engine, drop your bombs and let them burn" and "In a black hole, and I'm spinning, as my wings get shot away."

There is also the line, "There's a fox among the chickens," which some have interpreted as a reference to guided missiles (a radar guided missile= "fox 1"; infrared guided air to air missile= "fox 2", etc.) A Napalm missile is a "fox six", hence, "I see sixes all the way."
Iron Maiden guitarist Adrian Smith traced the origin of "Back In The Village" to an impulse buy: a white Flying V he'd barely learned how to play. "As soon as I picked it up, I played this riff and it ended up being a song called 'Back In The Village,'" he told Spain's Modern Guitar Lab.

Smith never really used the guitar again, but landing an entire song from it made the purchase more than worth the money.

Comments: 14

Mamoynas from Athens"i see sixes all the way", my guess is that the pilot of the bomber plain reports that he has enemy planes at his tail, aka at his "six"... One of them probably shot him down later "as my wings get shot away"....
Greg from Tampa Bay FloridaThere is a line in the song "Questions are a burden, answers are prison for oneself." That quote is taken from a poster in the pilot of the Prisoner to the right of the door to the labor office.
Scott from Edmonton, AbUm it's quite obvious this is about the prisoner in the line "We're burning brighter than before, I don't have a number, I'm a name."
Jeff from Staten Island, NyAtt Danny from Austraila:

Both The Prisoner & Back in The Village are based on the Tv Show The Prisoner
Guido from Milano, ItalyThe song is definitely about the tv series "The Prisoner". The "Village" was the name of the "prison" where the characters were being imprisoned. And the whole band, expecially Dickinson and Harris, was obsessed by this tv series, so they dedicate to it two songs.
Guido from Milano, ItalyThe verse "I see sixes all the way" is referring to the "number six" a character of the Prisoner, where all the people are called by numbers. Remember the intro of "The Prisoner" from "The Number of the beast"? "Who are you?" "The new number two" "Who's is number one?" "You are number six..."
Danny from Sydney, Australia'the prisoner' is based on the show 'the prisoner', not'Back in the village'. Maiden rule
Rob from Las Vegas, Nvthe number of the beast if i'm not mistaken is about a dream. steve harris was studying or was an architect bruce dickenson is an accomplished fencer (sword fighter) as i like to call it. get 12 wasted years it'll give you some early info. as far as song insight. checkin' the memory not much there
David from Petaluma, CaBruce didn't get his pilot license until 1993. But he did have an interest in aviation since childhood. He did not pen Aces high. Steve Harris wrote that.
Claudio from Genova, ItalyThe song also contains a "Village" motto:
"Questions are a burden (for the others) and answers are prisons for oneselves"
Brett from Edmonton, CanadaWell, I was glad to compliment your fine work.
Jeff from Haltom City, TxThanks, Brett. I wrote that one a long, long time ago, back when I was the only person that had posted material about Iron Maiden songs.
Brett from Edmonton, CanadaDone. :)
Jeff from Haltom City, TxAs for me, I'm still waiting for someone, anyone!, else to post some Songfacts about any Iron Maiden song, particularly something about the works of the band's better songwriter, Adrian Smith. Some Artistfacts would also be nice; there's a lot of stuff I don't know about this band, despite the fact that I'm the only person who's ever posted any facts about them (as of today).

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