Not wanting to use his real name and jeopardize his reputation as a country artist, Starday Records released it under the pseudonym "Thumper Jones."
With the explosion in popularity of Elvis Presley in 1956, country music lost a sizeable portion of its young audience and scrambled to adapt.
As biographer Bob Allen put it in his book George Jones: The Life and Times of a Honky Tonk Legend, "It temporarily sent the country music industry sprawling flat on its ass.
Jones retained a lifelong disdain for the rock and roll sides he cut during this time, joking in his 1995 autobiography I Lived to Tell It All, "During the years, when I've encountered those records, I've used them for Frisbees.
Moreover, Jones' first #1 country hit, "White Lightning", was written by J.P. Richardson, better known as rockabilly star the Big Bopper, and also had a rock and roll edge.