The 5 Best Songs Of The Week

Margaret names Bloodsports’ “Ten Thousand Feet” her song of the week, praising its slow, tense build and release. The track draws on the story of baseball player Joe Sprinz’s dangerous attempt to catch a ball dropped from a blimp, using sound to evoke both the quiet before impact and the collision itself.

In 1939, Sprinz caught a ball dropped from 437 feet, then tried to catch one dropped from 800 feet. It struck his glove and drove it into his face, breaking his jaw in a dozen places and leaving him unconscious; he later suffered headaches but lived to 91. The article describes Sam Murphy’s vocals as dragging and wavering, while the song’s ominous pulse grows into a hypnotic drive.