Laura Jansen is primed to break out in 2011 with her US debut album Bells, a collection of piano-based alt-pop songs, out March 22 on Decca Records. Born in the Netherlands to a family constantly on the move, the LA-based Jansen spent her teens moving around Europe and the US. That sense of longing for connection and a hunt for home, along with a Christmas Day end to a rocky relationship, deeply affects the Hotel Café mainstay’s music.

In early 2011, Jansen will tour with Joshua Radin and Cary Brothers, make a stop at SXSW and head out on the Hotel Café tour later in the year. This is Jansen’s second tour with Radin, who fell in love with her music after seeing her play the Hotel Café, the LA hotbed and musical incubator. Laura was even invited to perform with Joshua at Ellen DeGeneres’ wedding. Jansen’s touring partners have also included Ingrid Michaelson and William Fitzsimmons.

Bells, already platinum in Jansen’s native Holland, is a layered confection of piano melodies and pristine vocals, with all songs written by Jansen except for a bare-bones cover of Kings of Leon’s “Use Somebody,” which has spent over a year in the top regions of the Dutch singles chart. “Single Girls,” the album’s emotionally loaded first single, is a breathy, delicate pop metaphor for the devastation of getting your heart smashed to pieces. Title track “Bells,” inspired by the homesickness felt after a real-life breakup and the pealing of church bells, is a pure outpouring of sweetness and grief. But it’s not all songs of woe. At the other end of the spectrum, the playful, wily “Wicked World” transforms seemingly innocent fairy tales into stories of wanton naughtiness and urges listeners to let down their hair to its ragtime beat.

For many of us, suffering a painful break-up means a journey through the famous five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Laura Jansen learned this unpleasant lesson five years ago as she struggled to make sense of the implosion of a very stormy romantic relationship. “The end came on Christmas Day, which was pretty awesome,” she says jokingly before turning reflective. “I thought the pain might literally kill me, but it’s amazing the little things you start to do to save your own life. It’s fascinating.”

Jansen, a Dutch-born, Los Angeles-based singer, songwriter, and musician, chronicles those little things, like cutting her hair, buying pink floral sheets, and venturing out for a drink with the guy down the hall, on “Single Girls” - the deceptively simple, but emotional first single from Bells, Jansen’s upcoming debut album for Universal’s Decca Records. A dreamy collection of piano-driven alt-pop songs, Bells has already gone platinum in Jansen’s native Holland, propelled by “Single Girls” and a stunning cover of Kings of Leon’s “Use Somebody,” which has spent more than a year lodged in the Top 10 on the Dutch singles chart. In the U.S., Jansen is a fixture in the constellation of artists associated with Los Angeles nightclub The Hotel Cafe - a musical haven, creative incubator, and ultimately, national launching pad for such confessional-minded artists as Sara Bareilles, Priscilla Ahn, and Joshua Radin, whom Jansen toured with in 2008 and will hit the road with again in 2011.

Jansen connects by using the sweet clarity of her pristine voice to tell deeply relatable stories. The playful, ragtime-esque “Wicked World” urges listeners to uncurl from the fetal position, grab some friends, and go have some fun. “That song is about how it’s time to go out and meet some men. It’s time to do some drinking, because being depressed is getting old,” Jansen says. “It came out of the realization that little girls are raised on fairy tales. We are expected to be married and have babies. Those rules do not apply where I live. L.A. is its own little circus.”

On “The End” Jansen comes to terms with a relationship’s conclusion by realizing that there’s no blame to be placed. “It’s when you finally say, ‘We can’t fix this. We’re just going around in circles and I need peace,” she says. “I sing that song with a smile, because the turmoil is over.”

“I write and play music to work stuff out,” Jansen explains. “If you’re a performer, part of that is a public process, which is weird that there’s an exhibitionism to our therapy. But to me, that’s much more effective than popping some pills and talking to a shrink. It feels really good to get it out, and it feels even better to play the songs and look out at an audience and see someone whose face is saying, ‘I totally get it.’ That, in itself, is healing. I have had incredibly moving experiences while playing live. Some serious shit goes down at the shows. There’s laughing and dancing and lots of interaction, but the people I meet and the stories they tell me afterward are what make me feel less alone. I’m always hoping that somewhere in my uber-personal story, I’m hitting on the universal.”