Jont and friends played a live clip from Thursday's Blackpool Unlit, right into this very post here.

The evening was hosted by Jayne Morrissey with seven or eight local musicians and singer/songwriters joining Jont - it was a great night.

The live stream worked like clockwork, but we've had to take it out of here now because just a few posts up, it will be working its magic at the Birmingham and Bristol Unlits!

The wonders of technology never cease to amaze.

Mik Artistik is the real thing. Kindly coming out to meet us on Tuesday night in Leeds at the pub where he usually plays, we went into the back room and had our very own private acoustic performance from him and Benson and Johnny - basically the rest of his band minus the drum machine!

It was my first time hearing him: Dave had raved about him after he saw him play several times at Latitude this year, and I'd written to ask him on the tour but he never got back to me.

Fortunately we tracked him down in time to hear his surreal, truthful, razor-sharp brand of nonsense... unlike anything you'll hear but not a million miles away from Ivor Cutler, Ian Dury, Mark E Smith, Edward Lear and The Streets wrapped into one... I dunno, difficult to compare because there is nothing quite like him.

It was good to talk to him and agree on how hard it is to keep going sometimes, but it's the only thing you can do... and for him it's really working out. That year has been a bumper year, gaining him thousands of new fans. People literally go completely mental for his stuff, grown men crying and buying up all his CDs!

Looks like things are turning out nicely for one of the UK's most unique artists - catch him while you can!

The votes have been counted and verified... we're delighted to announce the winner of the Have Your Say hat poll is the fez!

As this was the Tour HQ favourite, we're chuffed to bits and are currently working away behind the scenes to get a lovely fez to Jont for his Birmingham Unlit gig tomorrow night at David Bell's house.

We will announce the winners of the competition to find Jont's missing trilby and the poll prize draw shortly, but in the meantime thank you to all who took part.

Jont will be playing a song in the fez on Friday, so watch out for the video, coming soon...

On Tuesday we launched a competition to find Jont's errant trilby and a Have Your Say poll to decide which kind of headgear he should wear at the Birmingham Unlit this Friday.

There's two Flip Videos to give away and there's only a few hours left, so we want you to get involved and get voting! We've had some interesting tip offs so help us track down that hat.

So far the fez is in the lead on the Have Your Say poll and if you needed any further persuasion that Jont needs some serious guidance, perhaps the following video will provide this for you.

Here's Jont sporting a rather fetching tiara...

You wear it well, Jont.