"Five Miles Out" is a single

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

 by musician Mike Oldfield

Mike Oldfield

Michael Gordon Oldfield is an English multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, working a style that blends progressive rock, folk, ethnic or world music, classical music, electronic music, New Age, and more recently, dance. His music is often elaborate and complex in nature...

, released in 1982 (see 1982 in music

1982 in music

This is a list of notable events in music from 1982. 1982 was a big year in music with Madonna making her debut as well as the year that Michael Jackson released Thriller which became the world's best selling album and it still holds that title today....

). It is from the album Five Miles Out

Five Miles Out

Five Miles Out is the seventh record album by Mike Oldfield, released in 1982, at a time when his music was moving away from large-scale symphonic pieces towards a more accessible pop style. It is one of the very few albums on which Oldfield sings lead vocals, as he is noted for not having any...

and features vocals by Maggie Reilly

Maggie Reilly

Maggie Reilly is a Scottish singer best known for her collaborations with the composer and instrumentalist Mike Oldfield...

.

Song analysis

The song (and the music video) make numerous references to flight. The video which predominantly features the sky, a plane, a pilot, a woman in white and Oldfield wearing a headset is available on the Elements - The Best of Mike Oldfield

Elements - The Best of Mike Oldfield (video)

Elements - The Best of Mike Oldfield is a video collection by Mike Oldfield released in October 1993. It was released by Virgin Records on VHS and Laser disc...

 video.

"Five Miles Out" has a complex structure despite its unusual length, and the lyrics are about Oldfield's experience of a near-tragic flight. Reilly sings with a clean voice while Oldfield uses a vocoder

Vocoder

A vocoder is an analysis/synthesis system, mostly used for speech. In the encoder, the input is passed through a multiband filter, each band is passed through an envelope follower, and the control signals from the envelope followers are communicated to the decoder...

 most of the time himself. The song features the same guitar riff that appears in the beginning of "Taurus II" and during the intro a keyboard quotes the opening motif to Tubular Bells

Tubular Bells

Tubular Bells is the debut record album of English musician Mike Oldfield, released in 1973. It was the first album released by Virgin Records and an early cornerstone of the company's success...

, a trick that he repeats in later pieces such as "Crises

Crises

Crises is the eighth record album by Mike Oldfield, released in 1983. Oldfield's well known hit "Moonlight Shadow" appears on the album.- Album analysis :...

".

Charts

Charts (1982)	Peak position
German Singles Chart	42
UK Singles Chart UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...	43