Halloween has long been a great excuse to dress up and hit the town, so we've decided to make your life easier by rounding up California's best parties over the Halloween weekend.

It might not actually be Halloween on the Friday night, but that hasn't stopped some of the West Coast promoters from holding their annual Hallow's Eve celebrations a day early. San Franciscans get the choice of two medium-sized events, the first a bash with Dirtybird's Worthy that goes under the name Hallownasty, and the second a showcase for Ben Watt's Buzzin' Fly that includes performances from Justin Martin and Halo as well as Watt himself.

LA's electronic community can either check out Martinez do his techy minimal house thing over at King King Club, or go for the bigger and more commercial Hard Haunted Mansion event and Shrine Auditorium & Expo Center, which features Deadmau5, 2 Many DJs, Justice, Modeselektor and Major Lazer across both Friday and Saturday night.

Choice is quite limited for good electronic music in San Francisco on Saturday night, with the only obvious party to hit up being the launch of Raw Fusion's label party with Simbad. However, all things are go in LA, with James Zabiela, Sasha, Steve Lawler, Tiefschwarz, M.A.N.D.Y., Crystal Castles and Armin Van Buuren set to pack out the Los Angeles Sports Arena for a huge Halloween extravaganza. The venue may be large, but there's plenty more on offer in the city that night, with Sander Kleinenberg hitting Avalon and Deadmau5 playing The Forum. If you fancy something a little more underground, then hit up Doc Martin at Sublevel for some proper West Coast house vibes, or venture over to Deeper Moods and Droid's bash, which features a live set from Minus signing Ambivalent. 5 Comments