Small Professor is a producer from Philly who has been releasing music for about fifteen years, working with everyone from Guilty Simpson to Curly Castro along the way. He’s also made a lane for himself with his instrumental projects, most notably with his different “Jawn” releases. Just this past February, he gave us the wildly ambitious the next (temporal pincer) movement. Now he’s already back with another instrumental project, 36 Jawns.

36 Jawns is essentially a compilation of older instrumental tracks that Small Pro had made over the years, going back as far as 2015 in some cases. However, most if not all of them hadn’t seen the light of day before, so this ends up being something of a B-sides and rarities collection. The only thing is, when you’re dealing with someone as prolific and talented as Small Professor, what could have been a simple compilation release for the hardcore fans instead turns into a legitimate album. That’s because yes, the individual tracks are very good, seeing as how Small Pro is great at digging through the crates for some killer soul and jazz samples and flipping them and looping them in some really creative and unexpected ways. It’s also because Small Pro is so adept at sequencing the album. In most cases, even if the tracks are on the shorter side, thirty six is going to be too much. With Small Professor, he manages to sequence everything in such a way that you get a really beautiful ebb and flow, with all of these ups and downs and twists and turns. The fact that he does all of this without any major shifts in style is really a testament for how layered and musically complex his production is. In lesser hands, this would just feel like a beat tape and it would grow old after a while, but Small Professor knows that the devil is in the details, and there is so much subtle variation from track to track that you stay engaged the entire time 36 Jawns is playing.

Not many artists can pull of an album like 36 Jawns, but the good news is that Small Professor is on that short list. He has given us a gorgeous and soulful collection of instrumental tracks that come together to feel greater than the sum of its parts.