Lindley is way too often overlooked in discussions of guitar Gods, if it had six strings he could master it. And his own albums had a quirky charm with a whole bunch of styles all mixed together - and his cover of "Mercury Blues" is one of the great covers done by anybody.
I was lucky enough to catch him live at a local festival some years ago, and you nailed it. It was Lindley and Hani Nasr, a Turkish drummer who played the sort of tall drums that you can squeeze between your thighs or your arm and ribcage to alter the pitch and tone. Lindley was on a long necked three stringed instrument from Turkey called a Saz, playing slide blues on it. It was a strange and eclectic set, not really the Lindley show I would have chosen, but it still just blew me away. He's not just a multi-instrumentalist, he's a maxi-instrumentalist.
I call that year's City Stages festival my guitar god weekend, because I caught Lindley, Johnny Winter, Leo Kottke, and Doc Watson all in the space of three days. It was fabulous.
Anyhow, Lindley has done a lot of stuff y'all have heard, particularly if you are a Jackson Brown fan. The slide on "Redneck Friend" or "Old 55" and yes, of course, "Mercury Blues". He was a mainstay of Jackson's band from his first record till 1980 or so. He's backed Ronstadt, Zevon, Crosby and Nash, James Taylor, and many more on tour and he's done tons of sessions with a wide range of artists.
Here's a link to his web page, a picture of some of his instruments. The Saz is top row, second from right.
David Lindley - Instruments