MEET CJ: ‘American Idol’ Contestant Talks Music, Nomadic Life, and Living in Chippewa Falls
CJ Rislove got his start as a musician – and a nomad – at Chi-Hi
“You have such a fun life ahead of you,” said Ronald Buckles, Chippewa Falls High School choir director, to CJ Rislove after he finished singing a solo the two were working on together. Mr. Buckles would prove to be right, as CJ Rislove continued on to accomplish many impressive feats, including auditioning for season 22 of American Idol.
Born in Stevens Point, Rislove moved around a lot when he was a kid, landing in Chippewa Falls towards the end of his middle school career. “It's just the easiest answer when people ask me where I'm from because it is the place I’ve spent the longest,” Rislove said about Chippewa Falls. “The only time I went to the same school two years in a row was at Chi-Hi.”
His time at Chi-Hi was filled with music, as he took almost every music class offered. At one point in his senior year, he was taking seven at once! Outside of school hours, Rislove was also in the Jazz Band, Show Choir, the Concert Band, and the Marching Band. “I would basically just show up, make music, and then leave,” he laughed.
nomad land
After graduating from Chi-Hi in 2019, Rislove once again moved around, this time to Minneapolis and Chicago, all while making music, frequenting jazz clubs, and trying to save money. He moved back to Chippewa Falls where he finished work on his renovated school bus, the Jazz Wagon, which he purchased when he was 17. He remembers the exact date he struck out on his own full-time in the jazz wagon – Jan. 16, 2022 – because the choice to do so changed his life.
The first thing he did was join a school bus festival where he got his first taste of the nomad lifestyle. Rislove said the nomad life felt instilled in his DNA since he had already grown up moving around a lot. “I feel like I've lived like a hundred lives as a nomad the past two years,” he said, his face beaming with pride. “The quality of my friends is so absurd, everyone cherishes each other so much. It’s such a tight-knit community. … I’ve just seen things I never thought I’d see, and I’ve done things I never thought I’d do. I've grown a lot as a person in the past year: Even I feel like I got 10 years older.”
So far, Rislove has traveled to 34 states, which he keeps track of on a map hung in the Jazz Wagon. While his favorite state thus far was Oregon due to its picturesque views and abundance of trees (he made it clear he loves trees), Rislove also said Arizona has great nomadic events and an RV Town called Quartzite where he ran into his parents’ next-door neighbors from Wisconsin. He has plans to finish his map with the East Coast circuit.
AN IDOL IN THE MAKING
On March 3, CJ Rislove made his television debut as he auditioned for American Idol. He strolled into the audition room with a plate of cookies in hand, uttered the words, “Hey there, party people,” and blew the judges’ minds as he performed a song he had written just the day before, titled “The Astronaut and the Rockstar.”
Katy Perry went on to describe his sound as “Elton John, Billie Joel,” while Luke Bryan said, “I think he’ll be in a damn tour bus instead of a school bus at some point.” Needless to say, they passed him through to the next round with flying colors. Though he played another original for them afterward, “One Step at a Time ” – a song he wrote based on one page in a book by Charlie Mackesy – that part of the audition didn’t make it into the TV episode. Not to worry, you can see CJ performing that song on his Instagram (@cj.is.love).
When asked what pushed him to audition for American Idol, Rislove simply responded, “I don’t know. Delusion, probably.” He then said that he was in Oregon when he made the decision. “I was thinking about what a pleasure it is when people give you the space to listen,” he said. “And that is (American Idol). They're sitting at a desk and they basically say, ‘You do the thing you love to do. I will listen.’ And what a gift that is.”
After sending in a few YouTube videos, Rislove said the program responded almost immediately, though he admits it was likely due to his interesting hook – the fact that he lived in a school bus. He doesn’t mind that, though, as he sees the bus as an extension of himself.
“The bus has earned me those opportunities like that,” he said. “Because I maybe got myself farther in the competition, but the bus was the catalyst for that (opportunity) because it’s a cool thing that stood out. What a gift that that’s already giving me opportunities just for being the way it is.”
The Jazz Wagon not only paved the way for his television success, but for his creative passions as well. This is where he completes his daily songwriting challenges that he’s been doing for the past two years. As he describes it, he has “starting days,’ where he brainstorms all of his song ideas and writes them down, and then the next days are his “finishing days,” where he takes all of those ideas and turns them into songs.
“For me as a songwriter, it’s just what helps me from not getting burnt out,” Rislove explained. “I have a whole folder – the most absurd folder you’ve ever seen – on my computer with, like, a million songs, and most of them are awful.”
The main goal for CJ is to transform the Jazz Wagon into a full recording studio, one that he can take with him everywhere. “If you’re an emerging artist who is as frustrated as I was as a 17-year-old trying to record, I want to be the thing that I wanted so desperately when I was a really young person who didn’t know anything about music production.” He’s hoping to take a class this year to further his understanding of recording.
Look to the future, remember the past
Though CJ is off traveling the country in his wagon of jazz, he is still deeply grateful for where he came from, and of course, who he came from. He credits his parents, Valerie and Daniel, for all of his success.
“I remember telling them that I wanted to live in a bus,” he explained. “I woke them up early in the morning when I was 14. I’m like, ‘I'm gonna live in a bus someday.’ And I think a hundred other parents would have said, ‘Live on a bus? That’s crazy.’ I remember my mom just going, ‘Oh, that's awesome. Sounds really fun.’ And because of that, I'm able to do what I do. They never ever bashed me for being a musician or living in a bus or all my weird alternative lifestyle choices. … They were always there to support me.”
“There’s no other option for me. Music is it. I love it, and it’s all I know.”
cj rislove
chippewa falls native, American idol contestant
He’s adamant that no matter where American Idol takes him, he will continue to make music regardless. In a recent Instagram video, he explained that when he was asked what he would be if he wasn’t a successful musician, he replied with, “an unsuccessful one.”
“It’s really quite simple,” he continued. “There’s no other option for me. Music is it. I love it, and it’s all I know.”
Follow along as CJ Rislove progresses on American Idol (voting begins April 7) and follow his personal journey on Facebook and Instagram.
