POP MUSIC : Backup Guitarist Has Brought His Fingers to the Forefront

Guitarist David Lindley, best known for his studio work with such music notables as Jackson Browne, James Taylor, Linda Ronstadt and Warren Zevon, will perform tonight at the Bacchanal nightclub in Kearny Mesa.

He’ll be accompanied by his own band, El Rayo-X, which he put together after going solo in 1981.

Lindley, 44, initially gave his fingers a workout on the baritone ukulele, which he started playing when he was just 14. He switched to flamenco guitar, and by the time he was 18 he had won five consecutive Topanga Canyon Banjo and Fiddle competitions near his home in Los Angeles.

After several years of fronting his own country-rock bands in local nightclubs and at Disneyland, Lindley turned to session work in 1969, laying down the haunting violin intro to the Youngbloods’ “Darkness, Darkness.”

A year later, he toured England with singer-songwriter Terry Reid, and in 1971 began a long association with Browne. From time to time, he would temporarily stray to do studio work with various other Los Angeles country-rockers. In 1975, he strayed even further when he was asked to play mandolin on British rocker Rod Stewart’s “Atlantic Crossing” album.

Lindley formed his own band in 1981 and promptly landed a recording deal with Asylum Records. Since then, he has remained largely a cult figure, touring the country and wowing crowds with his amazing instrumental dexterity on a selection of guitars he buys at pawn shops and thrift stores.

Opening the show will be San Diego’s own Jack Tempchin and the Seclusions. With his former country-rock band, the Funky Kings, Tempchin the performer scored a minor national hit in the middle 1970s with “Slow Dancing (Swayin’ to the Music).”

Tempchin the songwriter, however, has provided a string of chart-topping hits for the Eagles (“Peaceful Easy Feeling” in 1973 and, a year later, “Already Gone”), Johnny Rivers (a 1977 cover of “Slow Dancing”), and ex-Eagle Glenn Frey (a total of five, from “I Found Somebody” in 1982 to “You Belong to the City” in 1985).