Solution to One More Try

by Andrew Thomas, Noah Snyder, and Aaron Dinkin

This puzzle is basically a (large) standard crossword. The solution to the crossword looks like this:

As is probably apparent, this crossword has two quirks. Firstly, the grid has four two-letter lights, which are generally verboten. In clue number order, they are:
TO
PF
OR
TY
or TOP FORTY, a clue as to what to do with the other quirk.

The other odd thing about the crossword is that 10 entries are in the grid twice. As it turns out, these entries are all the titles of Top 40 hits (that is, made it to the top 40 ranks of The Billboard Top 100), from bands which had exactly two top 40 hits (and no other singles ever making the Top 100). (The title "One More Try" is another such two-hit wonder's song which is thematic to the puzzle.)

Each occurs once across and once down, and in the same order in both lists:

Grid word	Other Hit	Band
LOLLIPOP	(B)arbie Girl	Aqua
SUFFOCATE	B(e)d	J. Holiday
REPLAY	So(l)o	Iyaz
INFORMER	Gir(l) I've Been Hurt	Snow
GETDOWN	Flav(a) in Ya Ear	Craig Mack
JUSTGOTPAID	Birth(d)ay Suit	Johnny Kemp
BRANDY	Jimmy L(o)ves Mary-Anne	Looking Glass
BARBARAANN	Runarou(n)d	The Regents
JENNY	Angel Say (N)o	Tommy Tutone
LEANONME	Why You Tre(a)t Me So Bad	Club Nouveau

(This additionally requires disambiguating which band's versions of "Barbara Ann" and "Lean on Me" are meant by the fact that The Beach Boys and Bill Withers both had numerous other top 40 hits.)

Reading down the diagonal of the other hit gives the answer: BELLADONNA.

This is one of several puzzles in the Hunt based on an idea that was originally proposed as a metapuzzle, but didn't make it into the Hunt as a meta.