Sleeping With The Past

As suggested by its title, Elton’s final album of the ’80s — his last before rehab — is rooted in his record collection: He and Bernie Taupin set out to create an album based on the sounds and sensibility of ’60s R&B. But ’89′s Sleeping with the Past is also very much defined by ’80s technology: Its primary instrument is the Fairlight CMI, a hugely expensive digital sampler favored by the Art of Noise, Peter Gabriel and other high-end dance acts and art-rockers of the era. Elton employs it ingeniously in “Durban Deep” to evoke the same dub reggae severity favored by the Clash; the result sounds far more like Sandinista! than anything by Lee “Scratch” Perry — and that’s OK, but it grates over the album’s course, ultimately chilling much of the songwriting’s warmth. The deceptively civilized hit, “Sacrifice,” nevertheless remains one of Elton’s most enduring post-’70s ballads.