Career Crooks is the Philly duo of Zilla Rocca and Small Professor. They made their debut as a duo just a little over a year ago, when they dropped their first album, Good Luck With That. Now they’ve come back with a new collection of material, Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing.

Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing is an interesting collection of material, existing somewhere between sophomore album and remix album. The album opens with a couple of new songs, including “Escapism 2.0,” which serves as a nice intro, and “Crook With a Deal.” Even though this is technically one of their new songs, it’s also a reworking of 50 Cent’s “How To Rob,” translated into the world of indie hip hop, as Rocca jokes about going after all of his contemporaries, making clever rhymes about everyone from Ninja Tune to Scallops Hotel, with a hook that declares that “I’m a crook with a deal - nobody buys records, so we rob and steal!” From there, we get a mix of five in-house remixes from Rocca and Small Pro, and outside collaborators like Fresh Kils, John Morrison, DJ Manipulator, Shane Great, Rolled Gold Beats, and Wino Willy. While there are plenty of remix albums that really feel like retreads of the original album, Thieving gives a lot of fresh takes on the material that builds upon the foundation and in a lot of cases really improves what they were doing. For example, take a look at the John Morrison Love Boat Remix of “Angel Dust.” On Good Luck With That, my reaction to the song was that came across a little bit insensitive, making light of the fact that emcees used to smoke angel dust back in the ‘90s. In listening to the remix, I have to wonder if it was just a matter of the lighter and more playful tone of production on the original track that didn’t make it seem like they weren’t taking things seriously. I say that because Morrison does a great job of bringing a darker and more somber tone to the production, along with a sample of a news report on the use of angel dust that balances out the handful of jokes spread throughout the song, and makes you think more about the concept of “freeing your mind” through chemical means, and what that tradeoff entails, in terms of physical and mental health. There are plenty of other examples of this across the album, where it feels like they were able to shed new light on the material, which is why my biggest disappointment is that they didn’t revisit my favorite song from Good Luck With That, “Mike Milligan.”

There are plenty of remix albums out there that just feel like obvious space filler in between albums. Thieving As Long As I’m Breathing is anything but a space filler, with a couple of solid new songs and remixes that place the lyrical content in new light and help you re-examine potential interpretations of the rhymes that Rocca is throwing down. It’s a fun and interesting collection that complements their first album really well.