Lewnatic is the solo project of Patrick Lew Hayashi, a San Francisco-based musician also known for his work with The Patrick Lew Band (PLB) and TheVerse. Initially starting as a rap-metal duo, Lewnatic has since evolved into a solo act that blends pop-metal, grunge, and classic rock, often featuring fiery guitar solos and experimental sounds.
Patrick’s approach is genre-bending, pulling from influences like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Silverchair, Metallica, and Guns N’ Roses. Beyond live performances and live-streaming, Patrick has carved out a unique identity in the music world as an internet-based rock band, balancing traditional rock grit with modern digital production tools.
Where are you from?
I was born in San Francisco in 1985 to a Chinese father and a Sino-Japanese mother. I began playing the electric guitar when I was 13 years old back in the Summer of 1999. Growing up, I faced a lot of highs and some very lowest of lows. When I was in middle school here in San Francisco. I felt so awkward around everyone! I didn’t get the girl at the time, and I was very much alone.
I felt a lot of adversity around me with people at the time, but it made me more determined to prove them all wrong, and I can persevere as a prolific Asian-American rock star in my own right.
How long have you been making music?
Around the Summer of 1999, my maternal cousin Andy was living with me to study abroad as an International Exchange Student at City College of San Francisco. Whenever we weren’t studying and at home, he began playing my brother’s Fender guitar and amp he left sitting in the closet. He would play Jimi Hendrix, Black Sabbath, and Deep Purple guitar riffs spontaneously, and that’s when I found my true calling in life! I took a few guitar lessons with a guitar teacher at the mall here in Daly City, but was mostly self-taught through learning tabs and cheat sheets for playing music online.
When I was 15 and going to Wallenberg High School, I started my first band, and we sporadically played music and jammed in our garage. Think it was around 2001 or 2002, and that’s when I officially began my journey as an artist! That would become the genesis of my music career in the Patrick Lew Band. Chances are high, if you go on your computer or iPhone and Google “Patrick Lew Band,” you will find hella information about me and what I do!
In 2015, during a difficult period in my personal life with exes and haters on social-media, I introduced my cross-dressing alter-ego Madeline Lew into the Patrick Lew Band music and story. Dressing as my male-to-female alter-ego also brought my music in PLB our first big recognition and we began gaining momentum.
By 2017, my mom died and I put PLB on hold for the next three years, as I was working a full-time day job at Pier 39 and playing guitar for other local bands in the live music circuit here in the Bay Area. During that period in my life, I created the band Lewnatic in July 2019 with my friend Ahmed at the time. We would play shows once a month at San Francisco’s DNA Lounge and also made a few appearances in Japan that August. Then the pandemic hit. And I brought Patrick Lew Band full-time with Madelime involved by mid-2020. And we began gaining all the good things we truly needed that eluded us for so long!
By 2022, I relaunched and rebranded Lewnatic as a touring and live-streaming offshoot related to the Patrick Lew Band. On July 17th that year. I signed with Bentley Records after receiving an email they’ve offered me to join their roster of talented artists under their label. To date, I released several EP’s and singles under the Lewnatic banner with Bentley Records, and one full-length album Starrcade. It’s been an amazing experience so far as a bedroom producer, guitarist, garage band, and being an online content creator that’s opposite of the traditional rock band that goes on tour and does everything publicly. I’m strictly an Internet-based rock band, and I feel that’s my niche and better accommodates my lifestyle and shy personality.
How many songs /albums have you released to date?
With the Patrick Lew Band, I’ve released about 14 albums, one live album, and several EP’s and singles under the banner. I may have recorded and posted and shared about 300+ songs with PLB on Spotify and online! I think it’s just an estimate however. I just love making music and getting it all out there, without a care in the world for society and etc etc. Under Lewnatic, I’ve released 3 albums, several EP’s and singles, and a couple of live recordings for sure! It’s what I do, and what I do best! I plan on making more tunes with Lewnatic as always. PLB is probably gonna be a legacy band that maybe do one-off returns in the future ahead, but my main focus is the Lewnatic thing!
Can you tell us about your latest release and the background/inspirations behind it?
I recorded and self-released the latest EP Defy All Odds under Lewnatic, following the indefinite discontinuation of the Patrick Lew Band. Since 2022 onwards, my music is half-AI and half-realistic. Like a hybrid! While I am not completely an AI-generated band. I use AI tools to create the instrumentals and backing tracks, and add the rest later on my own while recording and editing everything on my computer. Like my guitar playing, my bad piano parts in fragments, and my lead vocals too.
The whole theme of this latest EP with Lewnatic was rather personal. I just got out of a 3-year relationship with my ex Manda Kay, and I was dealing with how to rebuild myself mentally after the break up, and re-enter the music scene right after. I was also shredding my guitar solos venting about the current state of the world we live in for 2025 too.
I did use AI for this record, but also used my own parts here and there too. In a world where people are unsure about AI, I’m actually for it to an extent! It helped me keep my musical ideas fresh, because back then I used to play all the instruments while the “record” button was on as my computer was taping everything around me. It’s a convenient assisted tool for me personally, but I make sure to add my own guitar solos, and other parts too.
How have/did you end up in the music industry?
I grew up in the 90’s. Initially, my hobbies were pro wrestling, video games, and television. But I always loved rock music. I grew up listening to 90’s grunge bands like Nirvana, iconic British rock bands like The Beatles, Rolling Stones, and The Who. I also loved punk rock, chiptunes, blues music, J-Pop, and rap. I’d say my biggest influence with what I do is Nirvana, X Japan, Beyond (Hong Kong Band), and Yutaka Ozaki. I always looked up to and admired artists and bands that sang from the soul and stood out from the rest, managing to change the game in their own kinda way. I wanted to do that too secretly.
I didn’t have much in my early years, and a lot of it is very personal to get into. I was always very close to my mother’s side of the family, so one Summer growing up, my cousin Andy was living with us, going to school here as a foreign exchange student. He would be playing the electric guitar and amp that my older brother Rick stopped playing and left sitting dusty in the closet in our house here in San Francisco. That’s when I found my true calling in life, I wanted to be a rock and roller and guitar player! I also learned other areas of playing and making music, such as the bass guitar, piano, electronic music (through computer and smartphones), and self-marketing. Then, when I was like 15 or 16, I began posting my demos online on some websites and formed my first band.
That’s what started it for me! It took me a long while, but I knew this was what I wanted to. Over the years, I hustled hard, and played in many local bands here in San Francisco. But I was always focused on making Patrick Lew Band (PLB) get bigger and better, and that took a long while till like the pandemic or something. Now I’ve got where I needed to be. My algorithms on social-media could be so much better, but I think I’m legit and already validated for sure.
What do you think of the music industry in 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic hit?
It’s definitely affected the music industry in a big way. But it also gave me my first huge global exposure as an artist. That’s when the Patrick Lew Band globally expanded to like 55 countries in six continents across the world! It definitely sucked when I didn’t get to play shows like I used to. Since the pandemic ended, it’s been a lot harder for me to get new shows booked regionally and nationwide with Lewnatic. But there was the whole live-streaming and virtual concert thing on Twitch and YouTube, and that was definitely the “alternative” for my one-man band to keep everyone fresh and rocking.
I was an early adopter to live-stream shows at my garage or guerilla style busking in Antioch, CA back in the early 2010s. But the tech got better, and it became a more feasible option for me to get myself out there! Since the pandemic ended, concert tickets gotten more expensive, so has everything else. Like our groceries. And I love going to rock shows too. But the pandemic gave me ways to globalize my band and music and a new platform to step up from where I was before!
Who do you think is the most influential artist?
Definitely The Beatles. For metal, definitely Black Sabbath (RIP Ozzy).
Who have you collaborated with so far in your career?
I worked with local San Francisco punk band The Tortured as a fill-in for two shows after their then-bassist quit the band before they hired another person to play bass for them live. They’re known for doing a lot of show locally too! I also used to play bass for a hair metal band from Oakland back in 2018 and early 2019, and I was the co-founder and former lead guitarist for the San Francisco shoegaze band TheVerse.
In my former band TheVerse, we toured the Bay Area throughout late 2017 and 2018, and put out one EP. I also was a brand ambassador for Antennas Direct, and I met my greatest hero in modern day music, Miyavi, the Samurai Guitarist himself! There’s even a pic of me and him together all over my social-media!
How do you think you differ from other artists?
I do a very genre-bending type of music. It’s been described as a dynamic fusion of rock, J-Pop, grunge. It’s a hard to label and classify type of sound and style. Early into my music career locally, there was a lot of scene kid bands doing the same formulaic type of post-hardcore type of music. I definitely stood out with what I was doing then. I honestly don’t know what sets it apart, but I’m definitely an “alternative” to what was going on at the time.
Back then, you didn’t see or hear a lot of fellow East Asians integrated into mainstream society. K-Pop idol groups like BTS definitely opened doors for us. Seems like, the more resilient I was and the more focus I put into my craft, that’s when all those things I’ve got came around. The timing was kinda interesting, it all happened during the peak of COVID and #StopAsianHate. I always compare my early 2020s success in music to the Seattle grunge bands from circa 1992, marginalized faces in the music scene and social-media who finally found their way, breaking that forbidden door!
I released the latest Lewnatic album Starrcade in July 2024. It was a collection of all the best songs curated from the three EP trilogy (“Rapid Fire”, “Getcha Mood On Right”, “The Lost Souls”) that I released with Bentley Records in 2022 and 2023. I was sort of aiming for the sounds that inspired me from my youth, such as Grunge and 80’s Hard Rock. But modernized and updated for this decade, without sounding dated whatsoever. All the music I make is done directly at home.
I use AI music generators on my computer shamelessly, to create the backing track, then I plug in my guitars and keyboards onto my laptop and began laying down all my guitar and piano/synth parts. Sometimes. I add my own vocals and lyrics to my songs I write but sometimes don’t need it always. My mindset is, “A great piece of rock and roll music doesn’t always needs lead vocals.” I’m not a very good singer, so seems like, what I conjured up sounds fine the way it did pretty much. I think so, at least! But yeah, I was just aiming for a rock and roll type of record with Lewnatic, angsty yet hella moving and grooving.
Who will you love to have a collaboration with?
I would love to someday collaborate with Andy Wallace. Do you know him? He’s the audio engineer who mixed my favorite 90’s rock records from Nirvana and many more. If he’s still alive and active, of course! I would love him to mix my recordings with Lewnatic, and give it that polished rocking gritty edge reminiscent of the 90’s rock I grew up listening to!
What was the first album you bought as an artist?
I didn’t get a CD player at home until I was almost 11 years old back in 1996. But my mom always bought cassette tapes that I wanted to hear and listen to at the record store at the mall growing up back in the 90’s! I think one time back in 3rd grade, I saved up all my lunch money from school mom gave me in cash and got me Nirvana’s Nevermind on tape at the local Tower Records when it used to be at Stonestown Mall in San Francisco! After that, I think, was Dookie from Green Day and Use Your Illusion 2 from Guns N’ Roses on cassette tape. The GNR album that had the song that was on the Terminator 2 movie!
What’s your favorite song at the moment?
A lot man. I have a huge random personal collection of classic rock, punk, J-Pop, K-Pop, chiptunes, blues, and rap related stuff on my Apple Music library on my iPhone.
If you had to sell your music collection tomorrow, what album/track would you leave in your draw?
I wouldn’t sell a damn thing. It’s too sentimental for me! But I would sell old CDs from local bands that have people I’m no longer cool with for personal reasons and hold grievances towards, to the buyer at Amoeba here in San Francisco. But! The rest I am obviously keeping no matter what.
What is your favorite quote/saying?
“I make music because it’s the only way I know how to tell my story.”
“PLB was never about fame—it was about freedom. We were rebels with guitars and GarageBand.”
“Lewnatic is me, unfiltered. No gimmicks, just raw emotion and anime beats.”
“Madeline Lew isn’t just a character. She’s the part of me that survived the chaos.”
“I’m not trying to be anyone else. I’m just trying to be the best version of myself—even if that version wears a dress and sings in Japanese.”
“Being mixed-race in America means you’re always explaining yourself. I stopped doing that and started creating instead.”
“The breakup didn’t destroy me—it rebuilt me. Every riff I play now has her ghost in it.”
“Love is complicated. But music makes it make sense, even when it hurts.”
“PLB was a time capsule. Lewnatic is the future.”
“I studied philosophy, but punk rock taught me more about life than any textbook.”
“I don’t want to be remembered as a rock star. I want to be remembered as someone who never gave up.”
What other hobbies or interests do you have?
I play video games, collect gaming consoles and computer hardware and accessories. I also love watching Smart TV and I’m a home theater type of fella too. I love watching anime, sports, 90’s Nickelodeon, Lifetime movies, Cheaters re-runs, Unsolved Mysteries re-runs, and everything I find interesting on the Pluto TV App on my Xbox Series S plugged into my 4K flat-screen TV. I am also a huge fan of professional wrestling, love reading magazines about music, cats, and East Asian related stuff.
I wish San Francisco still had places that sold hella magazines tho! It’s been hella scaled down since then. I also immerse myself in the Asian-American and the Japanese community as well. I go to the mall and bar with my boys, go to live music and sporting events with them too. I also love cats, love Asian women and Latinas, and eating good food like sushi, Mexican food, Korean BBQ, and pizza too!
Tell us more about your upcoming project or this new project?
I don’t have plans to tour again anytime soon. But I do plan to do more virtual concerts on YouTube and all over social-media since I can’t get a gig booked as easily since COVID ended. I also plan to continue making hella music too with Lewnatic in my home studio in this 2-floor family house here in San Francisco and put it out there as much as possible worldwide! I would love to play a live show in front of a paying audience again at the local venues here in the Bay Area. But if not, the virtual and AI rock band keeps it flowing in today’s digital age! I am just trying to live as comfortably as possible,
I am a very shy and introverted type of person. I find the whole Internet-based rock band lifestyle and career choice as very rewarding and accommodating for my personality and current life. I wanna continue making bangers in my bedroom, continue making YouTube videos with my friend David Arceo (former Patrick Lew Band drummer, c. 2005-2016), and just live my life as positively as I possibly can. Away from all the negativity and roadblocks. Past, present, and future. Life’s too short.
I wanna make the best of it always! I think for me, I may not tour or play shows outside, but I may do more virtual live-stream concerts on Patreon or YouTube, like a V-Tuber for sure! I wanna make all that rock and roll music going forward, but experiment more too.
What’s in the pipeline after this project?
I think with Madeline, my cross-dressing virtual avatar in my music career between 2015 to 2024, done a lot of wonders for me. It literally saved Patrick Lew Band and my public image from going down the toilet in general, and on social-media. And brought back the momentum that Patrick Lew Band needed so desperately, after a few of my exes broke my heart pretty bad. And the haters too, on social-media. Then 2020 hit, a lot of press began writing about PLB extensively. If you Google “Patrick Lew Band” or look at my Link Tree page, you will know! Signing with Bentley Records was awesome too.
They were the only label that basically gave me a chance with my music, and allowed me fully to be who I truly am. I also liked how the label gives me the freedom to do my music under my own time, energy, and effort, and that I don’t have to tour or play shows constantly too! Especially when putting my music in Lewnatic out there too. I’d say, when Patrick Lew Band was inducted in the Akademia Music Awards Hall of Fame in 2023 at age 37, that was what made me very content and happy with how everything turned out for sure!
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