A drug dealer is walking to his apartment in Manhattan when he is taken hostage by Paulie, Pussy, and Chris, who have dressed up as movers. Paulie puts tape over the man's mouth and holds him at gunpoint while threatening his crew to stay away from their operations at Port Newark. When the dealer agrees to tell them, Paulie says he'll do it himself and executes the dealer. They subsequently discover a large stash of money in the dealer's bedroom and take it when they leave.
Tony meets with his friend Bruce Cusamano, who originally referred him to Dr. Melfi. When Tony gives him a box of cigars in appreciation for his referral, Bruce invites him to the golf club. Afterward, Tony goes to celebrate the recovery of the stash with Paulie and Chris and tells the latter that they should look at investing the money into stocks and initial public offerings.
That night, Chris takes Adriana out on the town for dinner and a theatre show. Afterward, they wait in line at a burger joint and Chris loudly insults the chefs, while a man in a purple hat eyes them quizzically. When they get up to the register and order, one of the patrons tells a man that Chris is acting boldly because he's connected to the Soprano crew. Outside, Chris is accosted by the same man, who reveals that he is a Gangsta Rap mogul named Massive Genius and that he's interested in doing business with Tony. He invites both of them to a party before leaving.
When they arrive at the party soon after, they meet with Genius, who tells Chris that he's interested in working out a deal with Hesh Rabkin to get back lost royalties for one of the artists Hesh represented during his time as a record executive in the past. Afterward, Chris tells Adriana about the Soprano crew's history with the record business. He reasons that they could do the same thing again, and Adriana spurs him on to take up a part-time role as a music producer. She offers to put him in contact with a band called Visiting Day, which is helmed by her ex-boyfriend, Richie Santini.
Chris organizes a meeting between Hesh and Genius to discuss the situation, and they subsequently meet at Hesh's farm. After going over Hesh's history, Genius attempts to coerce Hesh into giving a $400,000 payment to the aggrieved artist's mother and gives them a day to write out a check.
Bruce attends a dinner with his family and Melfi. He and his wife, Jean, tell her about Tony's gift to him, and he tells them that having a gangster living in the neighborhood is great. Melfi also unintentionally reveals herself to be very invested in the Italian lifestyle by pointing out that she shares the same love of Italian glass as Tony. During a break in the meal, Melfi goes to the washroom and scopes out the Soprano home through a window.
Chris takes Adriana and Genius to see a Visiting Day show. Afterward, she introduces Chris to Richie and he agrees to help them produce a demo but is leery about Richie's attitude towards Adriana. Chris pays for three days of recording time at a local studio but becomes incensed after seeing the studio producer and the bandmates get fed up with Richie hogging the vocal parts for himself. Chris goes off on him, while Richie counters that he's tired of recording and has to go to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. Chris eventually picks up a guitar and beats Richie over the head with it before telling everyone to get back to work.
Tony and Carmela are invited to a barbecue by Bruce. Carmela learns from Jean that they invest in the stock market, and subsequently uses a tip from Tony (who overheard a stock tip about a company that's set to go public soon) to place a stock order with a broker.
Tony follows up on Bruce's invitation to a round of golf at his country club, but it ends up becoming a quite bitter experience for him as Bruce's golf buddies pester and embarrass him with questions about crime and the mafia throughout the game. Later in therapy with Melfi, Tony reflects on the event as leaving him with a feeling of "being used for somebody else's entertainment, like a dancing bear." He wonders it if was spiritual comeuppance for how he and his buddies used to mock their cleft-lipped peer Jimmy Smash for his speech disability back in their adolescence.
Chris takes the completed demo to Hesh for his advice but is coldly rebuffed. Hesh tells him that the band doesn't have what it takes, and tells him to get lost. Afterward, Chris and Adriana get into an argument about the competency of Visiting Day, and he tells her that Genius supported her only because he wanted to sleep with her. He abrasively points out how she's letting emotion cloud her judgment, and she storms out of the apartment after claiming that he doesn't respect her enough.
The dispute between Hesh and Massive Genius takes a dramatic turn when Hesh reveals that one of Genius' songs uses a track from a song Hesh owns the rights to, leading Hesh to countersue Genius. Genius tells Hesh he'll see him in court.
Afterward, Chris sits in the Bada Bing. Hesh comes in to pick up some items and pointedly tells him that the song on the radio is a true hit before walking off. Chris continues to contemplate what's wrong with his efforts...
In the end, Tony gets back at Bruce, when he says that the club is not accepting new members. Tony says he is fine with the rejection and, as a form of revenge, plays a prank on his neighbor by handing him a package full of sand, asking him to hold on to it for him, while implying it contains something more sinister.
Tropes:
- Actor Allusion: Chris tells Adriana that he's played the Visiting Day demo for Silvio, who used to own rock clubs in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Silvio's actor, Steven Van Zandt, also grew to prominence in the Asbury music scene.
- As You Know: Tony briefly explains the concepts of IPOs (initial public offerings) and stock investment to Chris, seemingly for the audience's benefit.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Adriana expresses a desire to run a restaurant/social joint of her own while waiting in the burger joint with Chris. As Chris questions her on this, she relates she doesn't want to end up just another Mafia wife like Carmela who does little else besides housework and hitting the gym. In other words, she wants to be more hands-on in Chris' mafia activities. This ends up really coming back to bite her in the ass, and sets her up as a Foil to Carmela, who ends up protected from the legal and physical dangers of Tony's work precisely because she has no involvement with Tony's activities.
- Best Served Cold: After Bruce and his golfing friends treat Tony like crap at a game (via pestering him about his association with the Mafia), Tony gives Bruce an unmarked package (which is actually filled with sand) and tells him to hold onto it, leading the latter man to become paranoid and fearful over what Tony has asked him to do.
- Boom, Headshot!: Paulie shoots "Juan Valdez" in the forehead.
- Brick Joke: Melfi hears what appears to be loud grunting and noises of pain coming from the Soprano home when she is over at the Cusamano residence for dinner. Later, it's revealed that this is from Tony doing weightlifting in the basement. Then Bruce and Jean hear the noise after Tony gives them the unmarked package in revenge for ragging on him at the golf club.
- Call-Back: To the episode Pax Soprana, where Hesh mentions that he has money coming in from his royalties, and Tony mentions that it was some black musicians that wrote the songs and Hesh gave himself a writing credit in all of them.
- Cluster F-Bomb: Bruce's wife, Jean, notes how much Tony's personality has rubbed off on her husband.Jean: He hangs out with Tony Soprano for 15 minutes, and all of a sudden, it's "fucking this" and "fucking that"!
- Crazy Jealous Guy, mixed in with Foreshadowing: We get an early indicator of just how possessive Chris will be towards Adriana. The first mention of Richie's name comes up, and the one thing Chris notes with anger is that Adriana and Richie "fucked each other". Adriana on this occasion gives as good as she gets, "Well that sums it up nicely."
- Double-Meaning Title: The title refers to when Hesh Rabkin mentions to Christopher that he knows a hit song when he hears one, saying "a hit is a hit" and that the band Visiting Day's song is not a hit, and they are not particularly talented. Giving the title a double meaning, a hit is the slang term for a mafia-ordered murder; the episode opens with a hit on a Colombian drug dealer, and while hosting Tony in a golf game at his country club, Bruce Cusamano refers to mobster Carmine Galante's assassination as a "fuckin' beautiful hit".
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Chris' efforts to explain to Adriana that there's no merit to Richie scoring a breakout album and that Massive Genius is only playing her long enough to get into her pants triggers this reaction from her. It makes her that much more determined to prove she can be more in the mafia underworld than just Chris' arm candy. Ties in with the Be Careful What You Wish For and Foreshadowing noted here as well.
- Drugs Are Good: Chris is convinced that getting Richie and his band members to shoot up some meth will make the needed difference in getting a successful studio recording by the end of the day.
- Embarrassing Nickname: Tony takes to calling Bruce "Cuse" (short for "Cusamano"), which the latter takes slight umbrage to, as the nickname invokes a decidedly uncomplimentary way to refer to a woman and/or her privates. Tony (insincerely) asserts that that was not his intent.
- Epic Fail: It's revealed that Richie suffered debilitating back injuries from trying to grill a trout... with a downed power line. Chris is amazed after Adriana tells him this story.
- Fell Off the Back of a Truck: Tony says this when he gives Bruce a box of expensive (and highly illegal) Cuban cigars.
- Foreshadowing:
- Adriana relates to Chris she wants her own restaurant / social hangout, and also wants in on his action. It offers our first glimpse of the whole Crazy Horse arc to come.
- The scene of watching Richie in the club. Everybody in the club boos him. Massive Genius by the way doesn't look even remotely interested in the band, and he has his Male Gaze fixated on Adriana.
- Hope Spot: For a moment, it seems as though Paulie is letting the drug dealer in the opening scene off with a message warning him to stay away from Port Newark. Then Paulie says he'll tell the other dealers himself, and nonchalantly shoots the man in the head.
- Hypocrite: The entire plotline with Bruce and his wife knowingly runs into this. Bruce and his friends seemingly look down on Tony because of his association with the mob and mock him openly. However, Bruce, Jean, and their friends engage in White-Collar Crime, but try to downplay their association with it (as opposed to Tony, who makes up stories so the Mafia seems more glamorous than it really is).
- Ignored Expert: Hesh to a degree. He gives Chris some Brutal Honesty that Visiting Day just doesn't have what it takes. Chris initially bristles against Hesh but admits he's right a little while later. But Adriana refuses to recognize that Hesh may actually know what he's talking about and presses on.
- Improvised Weapon: Chris uses an acoustic guitar to beat Richie after the latter tries to shirk his duties in the recording studio.
- It's Cuban: Bruce marvels at how his neighbor Tony managed to procure some premium Cuban cigars despite them being illegal. It's implied Tony was able to do so because he's in the mafia.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Chris eventually realizes he and Adriana need to give up on their music business ambitions.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Tony honestly admits to experiencing this during one of his sessions with Dr. Melfi. He and his friends use to have fun at the expense of a kid with a speech disability named Jimmy Smash, by convincing him to sing Mack the Knife for their amusement. Tony later heard that Jimmy cried himself to sleep every night afterward. He now knows exactly how Jimmy feels after Bruce and company humiliate him at the golf course over his ties to the Mafia.
- Male Gaze: Massive Genius really has the hots for Adriana, and is transfixed on her whenever they're in the same room.
- Manchild: Richie is implied to be this, as Adriana explains that he's still living at home at the age of 30. Richie is later shown to be belligerent and suffering from Small Name, Big Ego, while crowing about his day job working at a Kinko's copy store.
- Ms. Fanservice: Adriana, who spends most of her scenes in various states of undress.
- N-Word Privileges: The Jewish Hesh seems to think he's entitled to these, as he freely throws the word around when Genius demands restitution.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Plenty to go around, with a lot of it amounting to characters mutually lobbing insults and stereotypes at each other.
- It's a given that the Jersey mobsters look down their noses at Massive Genius and his crew. Note the Shout-Out to Hoodlum described below.
- Chris in particular is Tempting Fate by whining about he's being made to wait because he doesn't have a welfare cheque like the Black patrons.
- Hesh lets on that he himself has less than flattering views of Black men, likening their ancestors to bush savages chasing around animals in war paint. The collection of framed pictures on his wall also proves that Massive Genius was right, he does have a history of exploiting talented Black musicians and walking home with the lion's share of the profits. A quite curious case, as we will learn that he has a Race Fetish for Black women.
- Massive Genius and his crew in turn openly believe the Greedy Jew stereotypes.
- Adriana also refers to Hesh as a "synagogue cancer".
- Saw "Star Wars" Twenty-Seven Times: Massive Genius expresses his admiration for the Cosa Nostra by saying he had watched The Godfather "like 200 times."
- Shout-Out:
- The guys quote the last words from Little Caesar - "Mother of mercy, is this the end of Rico?"
- One of Massive's entourage refers to Chris as Donnie Brasco.
- Paulie remarks that the "mulignans" working for Massive Genius make poor excuses for gangsters by the standards of The Mafia. Silvio, feeding into the mockery, tells Paulie, "It's a new fucking day!" Silvio is making a reference to a scene from the movie, Hoodlum, where Bumpy Ellesworth's men burst into a white-only nightclub, draw their firearms and announce "It's a new day motherfucker!" when staff tries to tell them they're not allowed in.
- When Massive Genius approaches Christopher, the latter states that he wants burgers, not "converted rice", comparing Genius to food mascot Uncle Ben, due to his skin color and hat(?).
- Small Name, Big Ego:
- Richie. Despite being a Manchild and only working a day job at a Kinko's, he whines to everyone how good he is because he "recorded in Denmark" and has just finished his "most introspective song" in the studio.
- Chris and Adriana as well, who suffer from the delusion that they can attain the same kind of pull in the music business that men like Hesh and Massive Genius have. Adriana in particular refuses to admit she doesn't have the ear for talent she thinks she does, while Chris gradually realizes that they need to fold the tent.
- Spotting the Thread: Chris catches Massive Genius ogling Adriana multiple times and realizes that Massive's only going along with the prospective record deal long enough to get some from Adriana.
- Tempting Fate: Chris antagonizes the (predominately black) patrons at a burger joint by claiming that they're all on welfare and food stamps and that his order is much more important. It appears that he'll get beaten up for his remarks until an off-duty cop points out to one of Genius' men that Chris is with the Soprano family.
- Title Drop:Hesh: A hit is a hit, and that is not a hit.
- Toplessness from the Back: When Adriana gets dressed after coming back home with Chris after the party.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: While Massive Genius threatens to sue Hesh for keeping the royalties from his artist (and Hesh countering that Genius used an unauthorized sample to create said artist's song), the matter is never brought up again and Genius never appears for the rest of the series.
- While You Were in Diapers:Hesh: You're talking to the wrong white man, my friend. My people were the white man's nigger when yours were still painting their faces and chasing zebras.
- White-Collar Crime: Carmela uses a stock tip heard from Jean and her friends (who all play the stock market) to make an insider trade on a company that's set to go public. She subsequently nets a large profit off it as a result and mentions to Meadow that she's just looking out for their future.
- Working with the Ex: Chris reluctantly allows Adriana to produce a song with her ex-boyfriend, Richie.
