On The Radar

Music platform · Verified

Gabe P’s neon-green freestyle stage: New York’s essential rap platform, from the Bronx drill wave to Drake and Central Cee.

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1.85MYouTube followers

About On The Radar

Every era of rap gets defined by its platforms. The 2020s belong to On The Radar — the neon-green studio where a generation of rappers proved themselves on the mic.

The platform was founded in 2018 by Gabe P — Gabe Pabon — a New York radio obsessive who started On The Radar as a side project while interning for the legendary Angie Martinez at iHeartRadio. The earliest editions were filmed in what Gabe describes as a closet: a tiny room inside the iHeart building, one microphone, and a conviction that rap needed a new stage. "On The Radar was never even on the radio," he's said. "It just kind of started from my love of radio and the fact that radio was once a place where everyone would go to discover new music."

That love-of-radio origin story is the whole brand. In an era when traditional radio was losing its grip on music discovery, Gabe built a platform that embodied everything a classic New York radio personality was supposed to be — the authority, the cosign, the gatekeeper of what's next — but rebuilt for the digital landscape. The now-iconic format is instantly recognizable: the neon green studio background, the cloud-filled sky, the crisp branded intro, and Gabe's signature sign-off as he steps out and the artist steps in. His "Yessir Baby!" catchphrase became so famous that fans stop him on the street to hear it in person.

Growth came in waves. The first wave hit during the pandemic shutdowns, when the show pivoted to Zoom interviews and kept the content flowing while the rest of the industry stalled. The second wave came with the Bronx drill explosion — On The Radar was there for the scene's defining moments, filming freestyles with the artists who turned drill from a borough sound into a global one. Ice Spice, Kenzo B, Lil Mabu: they all passed through the green studio. And then came the cosign that changed everything.

In 2023, Drake walked into On The Radar alongside UK star Central Cee, and the resulting freestyle became one of the most-watched rap performances of the year. Drake — never on anyone else's home turf, but with the superpower of making the entire rap landscape his home turf — sounded relaxed, seasoned, almost avuncular, dropping lines about Jesus and Julius Caesar that had the internet quoting him for weeks. Central Cee, then ascending to his first UK No. 1 with "Sprinter," held his own bar for bar. The performance was a statement: On The Radar wasn't the underdog platform anymore. It was the room.

The Drake connection runs deeper than one freestyle. It was a pre-"Munch" Ice Spice freestyle on On The Radar that first caught Drake's attention — the performance that helped launch her from Bronx drill prospect to global pop star. Bobby Shmurda's explosive return-era freestyle became another viral milestone. When the biggest artists in the world start treating your studio as a mandatory stop, you've built something real.

By 2022, the show had grown into what one profile called New York City's premier radio and digital platform for interviews and live performances — and then it went further, landing its own primetime home on Power 105.1, the legendary New York station where Gabe had started as an intern. The arc is almost cinematic: from the closet in the iHeart building to the station's primetime lineup in a few short years.

What's striking about Gabe's approach is the ethos behind the bookings. He's talked about learning from Angie Martinez — her ability to balance journalistic integrity with genuine warmth toward her subjects, her protective instinct over the relationships she's built. "I want to create a space for artists where they feel like it's a neutral ground," he's said. During the drill era, he'd sit with young artists and coach them through performances: "Yo, your brain is moving faster than your mouth. You got to take a deep breath and let it flow naturally." That mentorship turned the studio into a safe harbor in a scene that wasn't always safe — and when violence touched the drill world, he presented the platform as a peaceful alternative.

And it's never charged artists a dime. On The Radar's own channel notes are explicit: the platform does not charge artists or participants any fees to perform or appear, and anyone asking for payment to secure a slot is fraudulent. In an industry full of pay-to-play schemes, that's a line in the sand.

The platform has kept expanding its footprint. There's the On The Radar Records channel, a clips channel, an Audiomack partnership streaming the freestyle playlist offline, and in 2026 a BandLab campaign sending one winning artist to the iconic NYC studio — turning the dream of the green room into an open contest. The artist roster has gone global: AJ Tracey, Giggs, and a growing wave of Afrobeats artists alongside the New York core. Gabe's mantra, borrowed from his mentor: "What would Angie do?"

As Dazed put it in 2025: the 90s had Sway in the Morning, the 2000s had the BET freestyles, the 2010s had the XXL Freshman cyphers — and the 2020s have On The Radar. It's the era's defining freestyle platform, built by a radio kid with a microphone and a dream of the green room.

Previously covers On The Radar because the most important stage in modern rap isn't an arena — it's a neon-green studio in New York, and Gabe P built it from a closet.