Her Wallpaper Reverie (1999; TAIS 04)

Her Wallpaper Reverie is The Apples in stereo's finest effort to date -- the band's most overtly psychedelic record, it's also their most experimental, achieving a near-perfect balance between candy-colored popcraft and musique concrete-influenced interludes. In a sense, the disc is a response to the grand ambitions of fellow Elephant 6-ers Olivia Tremor Control and their likeminded Black Foliage album, but The Apples' integration of Beatlesque melodies and experimental noises is much more seamless; not only are Her Wallpaper Reverie's songs the best Robert Schneider's yet written, but they're produced with a new richness of detail -- from the wonderfully Lennon-esque "Strawberryfire" to the Kinks-ish "Ruby," the music positively shimmers. - Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide