Back in 2019, a little over a year into her transition, singer-songwriter Teddy Geiger decided to spend three months in Madrid reconnecting with herself. Visiting friends and family, Geiger wanted an escape from her life in Los Angeles and a chance to reflect on all the change the last year of her life had brought.
It didn’t take long for that period of reflection to fuel Geiger’s inspiration, leading to a series of songwriting sessions while on vacation. “I had a little makeshift setup at the kitchen table for recording with a guitar and a bandurria,” Geiger tells Billboard. “I was stepping into being seen as female in the world, and this allowed me to take the time to express that.”
The result of that three-month Spanish sojourn is Teresa, Geiger’s upcoming sophomore LP under her solo moniker teddy<3. Due out October 1 via STEM, the new album outlines the singer-songwriter’s journey towards understanding herself and her place in the world.
Where Geiger’s debut album as teddy<3, 2018’s LillyAnna, widened its scope to encompass myriad ideas and genres, Teresa thrives in its cohesion. Soaked in luscious dream-pop soundscapes that smoothly transition from one track to the next, the forthcoming album soundtracks an artist fully immersing herself in a distinct persona.
As Geiger tells it, that was largely the point; every part of Teresa, from its production to its title, lends itself to a specific vision of herself. “Teresa became the truest version of myself,” Geiger says. “I started writing the name on the shower wall and using that as a reminder to say, ‘Okay, there’s this essential person in me that I want to feel connected to and be able to express fully.’”
The name itself came from an innocuous interaction with a stranger on the streets of Spain in 2019 — when Geiger told them that her name was Teddy, they immediately mistook her name for “Terri,” thinking it was short for Teresa. “We went back and forth for a minute, and eventually I was just like, ‘You know what? Yeah. I like that,’” she says.
A clear-cut example of the existentialist songwriting Geiger explores throughout Teresa is “Never Enough,” the project’s second single debuting exclusively on Billboard. Over a relentless guitar line that slowly devolves into a hypnotic pop beat, Geiger’s faded voice ponders at what point she’ll finally reach satisfaction with what she has.
“I remember being really fixated on the idea of wondering when enough is actually enough,” Geiger says of the new song. “Once you have a little bit of something, it’s never quite enough; when the show has been binged, you want more of it. You’re always left feeling like there’s something lacking, unless you can come to peace with the feeling itself.”
Much like the rest of the songs written on Teresa, “Never Enough” comes from a place within Geiger that she doesn’t often get to access. For the last decade, Geiger largely made her living as a sought-after songwriter in the industry, known primarily for her close collaboration with pop star Shawn Mendes; her work on the singer’s 2019 hit “In My Blood” earned a Grammy nomination for song of the year.
To this day, Geiger says she “loves” songwriting with and for various artists — in the last two years, she’s written for artists ranging from P!nk to Meghan Trainor to Machine Gun Kelly. But she also points out that the skill set required as a songwriting partner is significantly different from what’s needed to write for herself.
“When I work with other artists, I always want the ideas to come from them — I will very rarely pitch whole ideas to artists, but rather just be there to support whatever their vision is,” she says. “So, to try and turn that process back on myself and relearn how to do it felt like a challenge.”
Despite the difficulty, Geiger says she is immensely proud of the work she put in on Teresa. For the first time in a long time, she says she finally feels like she has a grasp on her identity as well as her career as an artist. “It’s been really nice to focus on what it feels like, what it sounds like and what it looks like for me as an artist at this point,” she says. “It took some time, but I’m now feeling really focused on myself and my artistry.”
