What is the meaning of the phrase "cut five sides in [something]"?

I was browsing the Elvis Presley page on Wikipedia when I read a strange sentence:

During a two-week leave in early June, Presley cut five sides in Nashville.

I've never heard this phrase before. It doesn't really come up on Google, except in copies of the Wikipedia article. In context, it seems like it could mean something similar to "went on a whirlwind tour", but I'm not sure.

I would like to change the sentence to use a more common phrasing, so it can be understood by a wider audience, but I can't change it if I don't know what the original thought was!

One side in 1960 was in 10" 45 format. Which meant max time per side was about 10-11 minutes.

So Elvis did about 50-55 minutes of total music, which would roughly be a (long) modern CD.

Note that this is a long estimate. In likelihood they wouldn't be able to format the sides to hit the maximum that exact. Probably 10-12 songs, 40-45 minutes. Would need to look into his songs developed around that time and their length to figure out the exacts.