Yeah, it's basically a single entendre.
I found it through a cover version by Robert Crumb's band.
Pretty cool version as well.

Gotta get some Andre Williams into this thread. Like Wynonie Harris, he's more rhythm & blues than straight-up blues...

I'm running
Yes before it's too late
Trying to get away
From that jail bait

It's a rough temptation
But a common invitation
And a good association
But a quick elimination
That will take you out of circulation
Yes I'm talking about that younger generation

So take my advice fellas
For goodness sake
15, 16, 17 that's jail bait

Now they swear that they're in love
That you and her got stars above
And she's lookin' mighty good
Just like a young girl should

We try to tell ya no
And let that young girl go
But you, you know it all
You have yourself a ball

And now that it's too late
As you look from cell number eight
I tried to tell you old mate

17 and a half is still jail bait

So tomorrow's the date
For the trial of jail bait
And this you watch and see
The young girl will go free
And you'll get one to three

So out the door she walks
To another man she talks
Before you can count
From one to eight
Another man in for
Jail bait

Please mister judge
If you just let me go this time
I won't mess with them young girls no more
I swear I'm not gonna bother them no more Mister Judge
I ain't gonna bother none fifteen
I ain't gonna bother none sixteen
I ain't gonna bother none seventeen
I ain't gonna mess with none eighteen
I'm gonna leave them twenty-year-old ones alone too
Gonna get me a girl about forty-two
If you just believe what I say and let me go Mister Judge
Please Mister Judge I ain't gonna bother them young girls no more
Gimme a break Mister Judge
Please Mister Judge



:cool:

Well,you got your answer and also schooled some of us in the process,:)

^ :laughing: That song is so politically incorrect - it's great! In some liner notes I once saw a song described as "a slow-drag whorehouse number". Don't really know what it means, but I feel it might apply to the leisurely rhythm of Jail Bait.

^ Many thanks for your positive feedback, whipsy, and welcome to MB! :wave:
Sometimes posting in these threads feels like chucking stones into a pond so it's really nice to hear that someone at least has got something out of it. Any contributions of your own to make?

Meanwhile, here's Dana Gillespie's better-than-the-original cover of a Clarence Williams song, from an album that she rather wittily called Blue Job :-

Lisnaholic,hahhahha I love it.


I have no contriutions,I'm a student.

^ Glad you liked it, whipsy ! If you are a student of music, you have come to a great place: you can learn by asking, or by exploring some of the various threads. In the Editor's Choice section, for instance, there's an index of albums, put together at a time when members aspired to make MB a well-organised resource.

I think I speak for many members when I say that enthusiasm counts for more than expertise here.:)

Lots of old blues were deliciously bawdy, lots of double entendres and the like. Not all heterosexual either. Ma Rainey 's "Prove It On Me Blues" ,lines like "went out last night with a crowd of my friends must have been women cause I don't like no men"" on the album AC/DC Blues, a collection of old blues songs about gay and lesbian relationships.
And of course all the blues tunes referring to "jellyroll" or "jelly".
John Jackson- "girl named Irene, got good jelly but she's stingy with me" and his song Diddy Wah Diddy" with the line " I got put right out of church because I diddy wah diddied too much."
And have heard that the word "jazz" itself (or "jass") was at one time slang in certain subcuktures for sexual inrercourse. May well be. Do know that jazz was denounced as immoral and decadent by the prudes and moralists when it first came on the scene. Of course that was in large part because it was seen as black music, the same as rock and roll was.

Wow, I have to dig deep to find any blues threads. I'll guess I'll have to start one one of these days.

Anyway, here's my contribution

Blues has always been associated with sex, get down and dirty on the Saturday night to the devils music, then repent on Sunday.

Some great tunes been posted there guys.

I very clearly remember hearing "Jailbait" on the radio when I was a kid. This would have been around 1960-62 in the Washington, DC area. No one can believe that this tune would've been played on commercial radio at that time, but I definitely remember it.