Here is a reissue album that is long overdue. Larry Rice --brother of Tony Rice --was a very early member of J.D. Crowe's Kentucky Mountain Boys (later the "New South") in the days when Crowe was holding down a long running gig at the Holiday Inn in Lexington, Kentucky (an unusual "plum" of a job for a Bluegrass band in those days). Rice played a fine mandolin and sang harmony parts alongside Red Allen, Doyle Lawson and Bobby Sloan. He cut one album of his own back then, for the King Bluegrass label (MR. POVERTY), then recorded 5 subsequent albums on his own for the Rebel label. This re-issue contains the best of his Rebel work, all done with a variety of great musicians including his brother Tony, who is very much present on 11 of the 16 tracks here and plays some amazing lead guitar. Some of the other musicians who helped on these tracks were Sammy Shelor, Rickie and Ronnie Simpkins, Mark Schatz, Sharon White, Vassar Clements, Tom Adams, Mark Johnson , Mike Munford, and Mary Chapin Carpenter. The songs are a nice mix of traditional (USED TO BE, PRETTY POLLY, OL' BLUE, etc), some fine newer songs (AUNT MARY'S SPRING and Arthur Hancock's lovely SUNDAY SILENCE) plus a nice group of Larry's own songs like PLASTIC PEOPLE TOWN, UNEMPLOYMENT LINE, HURRICANE ELENA and FOUR WHEEL DRIVE. Tony Rice's NEVER MEANT TO BE is a gem here, with Larry joined by Jeff Parker on the vocals, and Tony supplying great lead guitar. Larry Rice, who lived primarily in Florida, died back in 2006, but left us some fine Bluegrass music as can be heard here
