Their musical style employed a humorous mixture between rock and a wide range of styles, often borrowing elements from other music, among which were the main riff of the Portuguese Vira ("Vira-Vira"), Northeastern Brazilian rhythms like forró ("Jumento Celestino"), Mexican music ("Pelados em Santos"), heavy metal ("Débil Metal"), sertanejo ("Bois Don't Cry"), and even pagode ("Lá Vem o Alemão").
The band's name carries a double-entendre as, in Portuguese, mamonas can be either the name of the Castor oil plant, which contains the highly toxic compound ricin (their logo incorporated a castor bean) or the augmentative for mamas, meaning breasts (which were prominently pictured on the album cover).
The band mentioned model Mari Alexandre as an influence to the name, and even translated the name into English as "Killer Big Breasts".
When it was clear that their comic skills and funny songs were better accepted than their serious performance, the band decided to fully embrace the comedy in their music, including a change to a double entendre name.
After a show in Brasília, the band was flying to São Paulo-Guarulhos International Airport, in Guarulhos.
Along with the band members, four other people died in the crash: - Jorge Germano, the pilot; - Alberto Takeda, the co-pilot; - Isac Souto, a roadie and Dinho's cousin; and - Sérgio Saturnino, their body guard.
Band member Júlio Rasec told his hairdresser (who made a video in his salon of it) he'd had a nightmare the previous evening about a plane crashing and that he did not know what that meant.
Their short-lived fame and devastating deaths are strongly remembered in Brazil today, and their songs are celebrated and influential in the Brazilian music industry.
As it flew around the runway for a second attempt to land, it crashed into the side of a heavily forested mountain in the Cantareira range, at 23:16 (Brazil Standard Time, UTC-3:00).
Júlio was a good composer and would sing songs live such as Sábado de Sol and Sabão Crá-Crá.