Album Review: Somebody's Miracle by Liz Phair

Now that she's made a clean break from indie rock, severing herself from her past to such an extent that she will never be judged alongside such 1993 peers as PJ Harvey, Tanya Donelly, and Stephen Malkmus, she's content to make a full-fledged, unabashed adult alternative album, one that's so scrubbed and polished, transitions between songs are nearly imperceptible. If the last album was her attempt to be Avril, this is her Sheryl Crow album, pitched halfway between the bright surfaces of C'mon, C'mon and the laid-back, classy Globe Sessions, and while that's a maturer vibe, it doesn't necessarily always fit Phair well. There are two main, interrelated problems here: the production, largely credited to John Alagía but there are four other producers here, is so smooth and polished, the album winds up sounding kind of dull, particularly because Phair's thin, reedy voice just isn't suited for big, overblown productions like this.

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