"Send Me to the 'Lectric Chair" is a late-1920s blues song written by composer George Brooks and made famous by Bessie Smith.
"[11] A reviewer praising a low-band radio station for its unusual programming noted "an inspired couple of hours of Prisoner [sic] songs, ranging from Lefty Frizzell's majestic, gothic tale of love and murder "Long Black Veil" to Bessie Smith's touching plea, 'Send Me to the 'Lectric Chair.
"[12] Tracy Nelson covered the song for her 1995 album I Feel So Good,[4][13][14][15][16] in a performance that reviewer Paul Harris said "summons a perfectly Gothic essence of dread that few blues singers these days convincingly bring to the form.
[19] Nelson's version also appeared on a 2001 Rounder Records compilation album of women blues singers, Any Woman's Blues,[20] and in her 2003 live-performance album recorded at West Tennessee Detention Center, Live from Cell-Block D,[21] leading one favorable reviewer to comment on the "temerity" of singing this song in a prison venue, chalking the choice up to "her fabled perversity.
"[22] In 2004, artist Eden Brent included the song as one of the tracks for her debut album Something Cool, in what a reviewer termed "notably a great go at 'Send Me to the 'lectric Chair'" in highlights of the covers on the release.