Laura Barrett Celebrates Celine Dion And New Label

Laura Barrett, known for perplexing audiences for singing like a siren and plucking at an African thumb piano called a kalimba, has just signed with Paper Bag Records.

The label home of Tokyo Police Club and You Say Party! We Say Die! will re-release her 2005 EP, Earth Sciences, on Feb. 26.

Barrett couldn't find a better time to announce this news. In celebration of Carl Wilson's Celine Dion book, Let's Talk About Love: A Journey To The End Of Taste, Barrett will perform two songs alongside Final Fantasy, The Blankett and a Dion impersonator at Toronto's Gladstone Hotel on Wednesday.

Barrett's "Deception Island Optimists Club" single was a finalist for the SOCAN ECHO songwriting prize, she won the heart of CBC Radio 3's Grant Lawrence at Pop Montreal, she's been touring as a member of The Hidden Cameras and she's contributed music to stage plays, documentaries and multimedia projects.

The classically trained pianist's Ursula EP was released in December by Ta Da! Records and she's getting ready to work on her full-length debut.

"There's pretty much no bigger news than that, so when it happens, look for my huge beaming face," Barrett wrote on her MySpace blog.

Here are the tracks on Earth Sciences:
"Robot Ponies"
"Stop Giving Your Children Standardized Tests"
"Deception Island Optimists Club"
"Senior & The Blob"
"Smells Like Nirvana"
"Stop Giving Your Children" (remix)