He has also worked as a producer on Jenny Lewis' Acid Tongue (2008) and Voyager (2014), and as a songwriter on the self-titled record by Nashville band The Apache Relay.

Before graduating from high school in 2001, Rice befriended Chris Keup, a Virginian singer songwriter and self-styled A&R man.

Rice moved from Virginia to New York City at the age of eighteen with 1,000 copies of the Heart and Mind EP and the intention of launching his career as a singer-songwriter.

Imagery of the attacks and their aftermath appear in the lyrics of several of the songs on Trouble Is Real, including "City on Fire", "Put Me in Your Holy War" and "Salvation Day".

Rice lived in an apartment in mid-town Manhattan and worked different jobs to pay the rent, all the while writing the songs that would make up his debut album.

After several attempts at making Trouble is Real, Rice enlisted Mike Mogis, the producer of Bright Eyes, Rilo Kiley and the Faint.

The group, introduced to Rice's music through guitarist Peter Buck selected him to support them in London's Hyde Park in July 2005 in front of a crowd of 80,000 people.

Rice played the concert with his touring band, Death Valley, a lap steel and harmony group that featured Neal Casal (who would later join the Cardinals with Ryan Adams) and "Farmer" Dave Scher of the Beachwood Sparks and All Night Radio.

In 2005 Rice played Roy Orbison in the Oscar-winning 20th Century Fox film Walk the Line alongside Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon and contributed to its platinum selling, GRAMMY -winning, T-Bone Burnett-produced soundtrack.

This song would later be recorded for Lewis's second solo album, 2008's Acid Tongue, with Rice's original vocal part reinterpreted by Elvis Costello.

In the winter of 2006 Rice enlisted producers Farmer Dave Scher and Jason Lader to make his second album, Further North, at Los Angeles' Sound City Studios.

Rice again toured the record extensively both with a full band and solo acoustic, again mostly as a support act for the Good Life, Rilo Kiley, Matt Costa and the Redwalls.

In 2008 Rice co-headlined a tour with Maria Taylor of Azure Ray, and played Los Angeles' Sunset Junction festival.

In October–November 2009, Rice joined Vetiver's Andy Cabic, Farmer Dave Scher and Jonathan Wilson for a five-date California-only run of shows dubbed "The Emerald Triangle Tour".