How a Boxing Champion Named a Van Halen Album

Van Halen's 1991 album For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge continued their run of No. 1 records with Sammy Hagar as the front man. And while it didn't take a cunning linguist to figure out what the title referred to, a new video has Hagar describing how former boxing champion Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini created the name.

"I wanted to call the album F--- Censorship," Hagar says in the video on his Facebook page. He explains that, at the time, the Parents Music Resource Center were cracking down on rock and hip-hop records with explicit lyrics and he wanted to take a stand. "And, of course, nobody else is going for that -- the record company, the management, the marketing people going, 'How are you gonna get that in K-mart?'"

Hagar adds that, while this going on, he was indulging in his lifelong love of boxing and getting tips from Mancini. While being shown how to throw a left hook, Mancini asked about the recording of the album, including if they had a name for it. When Hagar said, "F---," Mancini replied with, "For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge." "I said, 'What?' and he goes, 'You don't know where that came from?' and I said, 'No, I had no idea.' Mancini explained the origin of the term and the profanity that resulted from it.

This isn't Mancini's only contribution to classic rock. In 1987, Warren Zevon wrote a song called "Boom Boom Mancini" for his album Sentimental Hygeine. The track chronicles Mancini's rise to the WBA Lightweight crown, including the tragic 1982 fight against South Korean boxer Duk Koo Kim, which resulted in Kim's death a few days later from brain injuries sustained during the match.

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