She's the spit of Uma Thurman and has the wit of a Germaine Greer. Not quite your average rock chick, really. Whitechocolatespaceegg is Liz Phair's third album, and as its polysyllabic moniker might suggest, there's more on this woman's mind than how to best arrange crotchets and quavers.

Phair has never been one to hide behind vaporous vocals or vapid lyrics. Her bald eroticism and funky take on life have always been enough to set her apart from the flotsam and jetsam of wannabees who hanker after the limelight and try to crowd her out.

This third album marks a distinct change, in both music and words from her previous, acoustically-driven releases. Then again, it's been quite a while since she last ventured forth (some five years) and in the interim, she's gone and had a baby - and not unpredictably, ruminated on the meaning of life.

And so it comes to pass that Whitechocolatespaceegg is a weighty work, replete with the joys and horrors of motherhood (how refreshing to get the down side too), the fickleness of friendships, and the bawdy delights of what Bill Clinton might call intimate relations in the back of a convertible.

Phair's pulled out the heavies for this one: everyone from the REM stable excluding Mick Stipe lends a hand (including Bill Berry), and Scott Litt twiddles the production knobs until everything's just so - a bit of feedback here, a touch of light accordion there, a smidgen of violin elsewhere.

Lyrically, Phair is unparalleled in her breadth of subjects and her depth of exploration. Musically though, she's a tad confused, with vocals shifting between twee 3 minute pop wonders ('Polyester Bride') and dissonant lonesome meditations on the nature of changing relationships ('Only Son'), where her voice hangs almost as though in suspended animation between syllables.

Phair's a formidable presence, but for once, that presence seems a bit disjointed, as though it's looking for a place in the queue, instead of boldly taking up poll position, as it would always have done in the past. Who knows? Maybe she just needs to renew her acquaintance with the big bad world for a little longer before she finds her own voice again.