Mick Hartley

It must be a thankless task, arranging summer festivals in Britain. All ready to go – stalls set up, bands hired, catering laid on - then you look up and see the steady march of steel-gray clouds, and, ah yes, here comes the rain. You're left with a few hardy souls wrapped up in waterproofs, and a load of unhappy stall holders staring out across a windswept park while the lovingly-prepared Jamaican jerk chicken, Thai curries and Mexican tacos remain untouched and unwanted.

At least Shoreditch festival had the sense to build a temporary structure for some of their events – including last nights comedy show – bizarrely titled "Best of Leicester Comedy Festival – On Tour", despite all the comics being London-based. 

And very good it was too. It's always a hit-and-miss affair, of course, stand-up. Get unlucky and you're subjected to some loud-mouth with "Don't get me started on…" or "And what's with…., eh?", in between picking on members of the audience and ridiculing late-comers. Last night the compere (some kiwi prat) was like that. If he'd tripped over and broken his neck it would have been the funniest part of the evening (only joking, folks!), but the acts themselves were great. Where else but London would you get a gay Asian doctor, a cockney, a Nigerian woman, and…well, Milton Jones is uncategorisable, but if you get a chance to see him I'd recommend it: great deadpan one-liners. "My friend was arrested in Saudi Arabia for shopllifting. Fortunately he'd stolen a prosthetic hand".

The laughter drowned out the sound of the relentless rain outside, as another damp British summer drizzles its way to a miserable close….