The Sopranos: A Hit Is a Hit

"This, as far as I'm concerned, blows away Matchbox Twenty."

My farts blow away Matchbox Twenty.

Let's be clear about this. The Seattle scene of the late '80s and early '90s- Nirvana, Soundgarden, Mother Love Bone, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, Mudhoney, Tad, Sub Pop Records, Jack Endino, K Records, Beat Happening- was one of the greatest cultural achievements of my lifetime. Derivative shite like the Goo Goo Dolls, Candlebox and, yes, Matchbox Twenty, is of far less cultural importance than my last poo. Agreed? Good.

This episode, obviously. concerns the music business- in a 1999 without Napster, where the record business calls the shot. But, digging deeper, it's about ethnic and cultural stereotypes. The music business may be negotiated by the comically clueless Christopher and Adriana, trying to big up this bloody awful band she likes; their old demo sounds ok, a bit Terrorvision, but it becomes clear they’re like one of the godawful bands listed above. But they are partly motivated by a desire to bring back Italian-American influence into music. Meanwhile Chris meets Massive Genius, an incredibly rich and powerful gangsta rap star and both the most intelligent and the most savvy character in the episode. His mission is to get Hesh, an unscrupulous record producer of the old style, to compensate a late musician’s mother for stealing her son’s profits, and he does this cleverly, in spite of the intransigence of Hesh, who seems to have far right views on the whole Israel/Palestine thing: there was no question of the peace process as it was then giving away “parts of Israel”, just the West Bank and Gaza. So we have the black man versus the white, and in this case Jewish, record industry.

But we also have Tony trying to make friends with his neighbour Dr Cusamano, who he describes to Dr Melfi as being a “white man”, an “Americano”, something he as an Italian can never be. That Italians should be subject to such racism is bizarre to this Englishman: we may have a Queen down in that London today, but we’ve never forgotten that there was once a governor from Rome. The Italians may flirt with Fascism a little too often for our liking, but the eat better than us, dress better than us, and give us a real sense of cultural cringe. I suppose it’s all subjective and the point is that racism is silly but it exists, and is complicated.

This is probably the most expendable episode yet, with not a lot of arc stuff, and lacking the usual sparkle. But it’s still a cut above most telly.