[11] The author Andy Miller writes the song's arrangement is defined by Mick Avory's "especially exuberant" drumming and the "similarly light and effective" piano contribution, played by either Ray or session keyboardist Nicky Hopkins.

[17] The author Patricia Gordon Sullivan considers it one of several songs on Village Green played in the style of music hall, a theme she writes Ray established on the band's 1967 album Something Else by the Kinks.

[22][nb 3] In addition to "The Village Green Preservation Society", the singers adopt other identifiers, like "the Custard Pie Appreciation Consortium" and "the Skyscraper Condemnation Affiliate".

[24] The lyrics of  ... "[The] Village Green Preservation Society" have been discussed often in writing on the Kinks, with the usual intention of finding out just how genuinely nostalgic or how tongue-in-cheek [Ray] Davies was with lines such as "God save little shops, china cups and virginity."

[26] Like Doyle, the band biographers Rob Jovanovic and Johnny Rogan each suggest that the song is simultaneously ironic and Ray's sincere expression of love for many of the things listed.

[35] Miller writes that though it "lack[s] the righteousness and glamour" of the Rolling Stones' single, "The Village Green Preservation Society" is a "quiet song of defiance".

[36][nb 6] Doyle considers the band's defiant sentiments an "anti-authoritarian preservationism of the little man",[38] pointing to Dave's later explanation of the song's opening harmonies: "It was like, 'We're impenetrable.

[43] In a 2009 interview, he explained that "North London was my village green, my version of the countryside", further mentioning Waterlow Park in the nearby suburb of Highgate and its small lake as an influence.

[49] Rogan further suggests "the Anglocentric ideal has already been tainted" by the mention of Donald Duck, an American creation,[50] but cultural researcher Jon Stratton writes Britons could still be nostalgic for the character since he had been popular in Britain since before the Second World War.

[10] To help promote the album, the Kinks performed the song on 26 November 1968 for BBC Radio 1 programme Saturday Club at the Playhouse Theatre in central London.

[59] The US release coincided with Warner Bros. Records' "God Save the Kinks" promotional campaign, which sought to reestablish the band's status in America after their informal four-year performance ban was lifted in the country.

[60] The Kinks' return tour of North America ran from October to December 1969, during which they regularly included "The Village Green Preservation Society" as part of their set list.

[64] In Paul Williams's June 1969 review of the album for Rolling Stone magazine, he praised several elements of the song, including its drums, bass and vocals.