Well "Danse Macabre" is french for "Strange/Gruesome Dance", so the Dance of the Dead is a valid point. However, I think it's being used as a vehicle to describe regrets of a life wasted on conformity and materialism.
"All my friends are skeletons/Dulcimers and chariots" - I think these are metaphors for the people around him. The people he's surrounded himself with are empty, they have no mind of their own and no heart. They don't care about anything important but themselves and are thus hollow (skeletons). A dulcimer is an instrument, something that is used by someone to make music, so this could describe people with talents in some form that are being manipulated by someone else (eg. bands used by record companies for money). It could also be someone who sings their own praises. Chariots are a vehicle and are generally very extravagant and decorative, so this could describe materialistic people, people who surround themselves with money and products that they thinik make them better. However, these people are just being driven by corporations. The lines could also be taken more literally to mean he has no real friends. His friends are skeletons (his own personal demons and what not), dulcimers (art in all it's forms; music, paintings, books, etc. that he uses to describe his own life), and chariots (all the materialistic status symbols; big house, fancy car, etc.).
"Prayers to God, oh prayers to god/Hammers for our hollowed heads" - Now that he's realized the error in the lives of himself and those around him, he hopes desperately for something to bring them all out of it. Thus, he wants a hammer, figuratively. The hammer could be used to a) knock some sense into the empty heads of the people around him or b) kill himself and just end the useless life he's made for himself.
"Oh, you had such big, big plans/Swallowed all your vitamins" - He wanted to do something with his life. He wanted to be a unique person and make something of himself in this world of conformity. But instead he just took everything that was given to him believing the mass opinion that it was good (much like humans automatically assume a vitamin is good for the body, but it can also have harmful side effects) and never questioned or disagreed. Thus, he became one of the conformists, just like everybody else. Clearly, his plans were not fulfilled.
"Wore your poems like a scar/Whatever happened to them?" - Perhaps there was a time in his life when he was opinionated and spoke his own mind. Perhaps there was a time when he was unique and expressive and questioned what he saw (as a poem is). But now he has lost that to the masses and is just another face in the crowd. He's not entirely sure how or why this happened, but it did.
"Was I sleeping all this time?" - Disbelief at the idea that he was truly passive throughout most of his life. He's shocked that he spent all his life going along with the opinions of the populist society and never made his own ideas or did anything important with his life.
"Was my shadow ever mine?" - He wonders whether he was ever his own man or if he's always been some product of the opinions and beliefs of society around. Can anything about him be called his own?
That is what I believe the song is attempting to convey.
Well "Danse Macabre" is french for "Strange/Gruesome Dance", so the Dance of the Dead is a valid point. However, I think it's being used as a vehicle to describe regrets of a life wasted on conformity and materialism.
"All my friends are skeletons/Dulcimers and chariots" - I think these are metaphors for the people around him. The people he's surrounded himself with are empty, they have no mind of their own and no heart. They don't care about anything important but themselves and are thus hollow (skeletons). A dulcimer is an instrument, something that is used by someone to make music, so this could describe people with talents in some form that are being manipulated by someone else (eg. bands used by record companies for money). It could also be someone who sings their own praises. Chariots are a vehicle and are generally very extravagant and decorative, so this could describe materialistic people, people who surround themselves with money and products that they thinik make them better. However, these people are just being driven by corporations. The lines could also be taken more literally to mean he has no real friends. His friends are skeletons (his own personal demons and what not), dulcimers (art in all it's forms; music, paintings, books, etc. that he uses to describe his own life), and chariots (all the materialistic status symbols; big house, fancy car, etc.).
"Prayers to God, oh prayers to god/Hammers for our hollowed heads" - Now that he's realized the error in the lives of himself and those around him, he hopes desperately for something to bring them all out of it. Thus, he wants a hammer, figuratively. The hammer could be used to a) knock some sense into the empty heads of the people around him or b) kill himself and just end the useless life he's made for himself.
"Oh, you had such big, big plans/Swallowed all your vitamins" - He wanted to do something with his life. He wanted to be a unique person and make something of himself in this world of conformity. But instead he just took everything that was given to him believing the mass opinion that it was good (much like humans automatically assume a vitamin is good for the body, but it can also have harmful side effects) and never questioned or disagreed. Thus, he became one of the conformists, just like everybody else. Clearly, his plans were not fulfilled.
"Wore your poems like a scar/Whatever happened to them?" - Perhaps there was a time in his life when he was opinionated and spoke his own mind. Perhaps there was a time when he was unique and expressive and questioned what he saw (as a poem is). But now he has lost that to the masses and is just another face in the crowd. He's not entirely sure how or why this happened, but it did.
"Was I sleeping all this time?" - Disbelief at the idea that he was truly passive throughout most of his life. He's shocked that he spent all his life going along with the opinions of the populist society and never made his own ideas or did anything important with his life.
"Was my shadow ever mine?" - He wonders whether he was ever his own man or if he's always been some product of the opinions and beliefs of society around. Can anything about him be called his own?
That is what I believe the song is attempting to convey.