Eurovision Song Contest 2015: Three charts showing what would happen if winning gave you lots of power
At 8pm on Saturday night, music fans from across the continent will turn on their TVs and tune into the annual Eurovision Song Contest.
As usual, the event promises to fill our screens with crazy costumes, emotional love ballads and over-enthusiastic presenters covered in glitter.
But it's not just a contest for raw musical talent – it is, and always has been, a very politically motivated affair. Stay up late enough for the voting results and the pattern looks more like neighbours and allies voting for each other than anything else.
Which got us thinking – if we lived in a world where Eurovision success was aligned with economic and political power, what would Europe look like?
Ireland would be the big decision maker
Move over Germany, it's time to make room for the new major power in Europe.
Since the contest started 60 years ago, Ireland has won seven times – two more than any other country. In Eurovision world, Ireland is truly the dominant player.
Germany, with just two wins, falls behind Spain, Italy and France among others – it seems musical prowess doesn't always match up to economic strength.
The UK comes surprisingly high up given its usual poor performance these days. In fact, it has won a total of five times, coming in joint second place with France, Sweden and Luxembourg.
Some of Europe's biggest economies would lose their voices
If Eurovision wins represented economy size in 2014 Germany, Italy and Russia would find they had lost their voice on the international stage, while Ireland again would soar above its neighbours. Luxembourg similarly out-sings its economic prowess to become as important as the UK.
Other than that, there would be some slight shifts – the UK and France , with the second and third biggest economies respectively, are already near the top top and most of the countries with just one win over the last 60 years tend to have the smallest economies.
The UK's influence would be going down the drain
In terms of total points received from other countries, the UK's average score has plummeted since the turn of the century. Is our musical talent waning? Are we losing popularity among our fellow Europeans like there's no tomorrow? Who knows, but we seem constantly on the verge of falling into the “nil points” category at the moment.
We had some good times, though, so we can't complain too much – between 1970 and 2000 we nearly always came high up on the list. Let's hope tomorrow's performance of “Still In Love With You” by Electro Velvet reverse puts us back on the road to success.