Old timey Bangor Halloween!

1. Friday night is going to be one for the books. In the Bangor area, your options include such memorable events as the Fiddlehead Restaurant’s annual Halloween party, with music from Magnetic North and $10 entrance fee getting you lots of tasty appetizers and benefiting a little girl in Brewer with leukemia. There’s also the Paddy Murphy’s costume contest party, which starts at 11 p.m. and which before and after features music from Forget, Forget. At Tantrum, Her Majesty’s Cabaret — of which I am a part, full disclosure — offers up a spooky night of sketch comedy and short film starting at 7:30 p.m.; there’s also a show the previous night (Thursday) at 7:30 p.m. and it’s $10. After HMC, there’s a big night of electronic music at Tantrum, starting at 9:30 p.m. and featuring DJs including Simbiotic, Dack Janiels, Creation and Init, Nocturnem Drafthaus has rockabilly rockers Three Button Deluxe, the Big Easy has a nights of 90s covers from Stesha Cano, and Ipanema hosts the Trendy Robots. There’s costume contests at places like the New Waverly, the Sea Dog and Half Acre, too, and at Geaghan’s there’s the launch of the Doug E. Graves Stephen King/WKIT brew. Up in Orono, Woodman’s hosts a Halloween party featuring music from the Skastitutes and the Round House Players. The night after — Saturday, Nov. 1 — is an understandably less exciting night, though there’s still several very cool events, including screenings of the Maine horror shorts series “Damnationland” at 5:30 and 9 p.m. at the KahBang Central Gallery, the Pitch Black Ribbons at Nocturnem, Riff Johnson at the Big Easy and, out at 4Points in Winterport, banjo wizard Hal Meyers.

2. It’s equally crazy down in Portland town. It’s probably easier to just list off all the Halloween options you’ve got. Port City Music Hall hosts an epic Clash of the Titans bash pitting dance rock against dance pop. Empire has got indie rockers the Box Tiger, Off & On and Slingshot Dakota. There’s a bluegrass costume party with the Tricky Britches and Hot Day at the Zoo at Asylum. The Space Gallery hosts its annual Halloween party with the Lovers of Fiction as the Kinks, Jeff Beam and Friends as Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, and the Blood Capsules as Roky Erickson. At Bunker Brewing, there’s Jaw Gems, Coke Weed, Foam Castles and Starship Luther. It’s Trap Nite Halloween Edition at Flask Lounge with DJs Dom Damiami, Che Ros and DJ Mom. And at One Longfellow Square, catch the one time only screening of the local band-heavy horror movie “Lobsteroids,” set for 8 p.m. and followed by a performance from High Ryder at the Golden Oldies Show. On Saturday, Empire hosts the Halloween Hangover Ball featuring When Particles Collide, Aloud and the Goddamn Draculas, the Jubilee Riots are at Port City Music Hall, and there’s some heavy metal at Geno’s, with Wolvhammer, Ramlord and Mortals. There’s also banjo legends Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn at Merrill Auditorium.

3. On the coast, take your Halloween pick of either the annual Halloween jamboree at Rock City Coffee in Rockland with Georgina Butler, a costume party with the Dolphin Strikers at the Speakeasy, also in Rockland, or in Belfast, Three Tides hosts an 80s-themed Halloween party with DJ Matty T. A few miles down the road in Bucksport there’s of course the final weekend of Fright at the Fort, a spooktacular haunted event at Fort Knox State Park (technically in Prospect), and in Ellsworth, Chummies hosts a costume contest and the band County Line, and there’s a costume contest at Finn’s Irish Pub, too.

4. It’s time to fall back this weekend, so Saturday night into Sunday, prepare to lose an hour of daylight after work, because for some still unexplained reason our country — which is not primarily agrarian and has not been for decades — our country keeps Daylight Savings Time up. I don’t see any daylight saved, do you? It being November and all, we’re getting into holiday season. Get some shopping done early in Bangor, with the annual early bird sale starting at 6 a.m. Saturday, with deals at businesses throughout downtown from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. Saturday also kicks off Portland Beer Week, with loads of special beer events at places all over town, including the Thirsty Pig, Central Provisions, Nosh, Novare Res and other; a full list of all Portland Beer Week events throughout the week can be found at www.portlandbeerweek.org. 

5. Or, perhaps you just want to hide from the Halloween-crazed hordes, the final desperate gasps of election season, Ebola, Taylor Swift, rampaging bears, exploding space rockets, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, #GamerGate, the Internet in general and the snow we’re probably going to get early Sunday morning. I don’t blame you. Read a book. Make pot roast. Watch a movie. Winter is coming.