Want to come and hang out with Suzanne Vega to celebrate the release of her new album, Beauty and Crime? Organize your invitation here - heaven knows this is going to fill up quickly.

Vega will be appearing in Second Life on Friday, July 13 at 4pm SLT (US Pacific), and will be available to chat with attendees inworld.

"Every visitor will receive a free player for Beauty & Crime, which can be used to outfit their avatar or to host a listening party of their own. Second Life users can also create their own musical street graffiti, explore the sounds of the city, and watch concert footage recorded live at the Hiro Ballroom in New York."

In the time-honored tradition of Suzanne Vega, Jonathan Coulton, Duran Duran, and Seether, all-female band The Hedrons plan to play a concert in SL on October 9th, making them the first British band to do so.

Ostensibly to promote their new single 'I Need You', the band will be hanging out after the show, so if you're a fan, now's your chance to get up close and personal! The concert will take place at their Hedron Dome in Nonsan. The Times Online UK has an article about the upcoming concert, though it describes SL as " ... the online fantasy world, where players live out their secret desires in an alternative existence." Sounds pretty sordid when you put it like that!

For more information on The Hedrons, visit their site.

The Infinite Mind sim opens today at 9am SLT and tickets will be available for the first broadcast from the sim at 5pm SLT today. As a Londoner, I have to say I am rather disappointed that the programme is going to be so late. For listeners in Europe, that's 1am my time, 2am for much of the rest, and just a tad too late for most of us to consider staying up on a Thursday, even for something as groundbreaking in SL as this.

I hadn't heard of the Infinite Mind before the publicity for the show in SL, and having looked at the range of subjects, I am very interested to listen to it.

As publicised before on SLI, the first episode will feature Suzanne Vega, and following episodes promise John Maeda, Howard Rheingold and Kurt Vonnegut. Tickets are available from 9am SLT from the Infinite Mind sim, built by Infinite Vision, but there are alternative ways to hear the broadcast if you can't get into the sim. There is a live video feed, and live audio with an unlimited number of concurrent users. You can catch the announcement on the forums here.