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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Crash Test Dummies drummer Mitch Dorge got St. Patrick high school students to let loose with a "Go bananas hour" last week, which turned out to be a two-hour musical presentation.

Dorge gathered a handful of student volunteers on the stage Jan. 30 to help him make music and asked the entire audience to join in.

"If my band is bigger, the positive energy is bigger," he said. "If everybody gave 100 per cent all the time, most of our problems on this planet would be over."

Dorge praised the students for putting their pride aside and doing something fun.

"Some of you were crying because you were laughing so much," he said. "We had a great time and none of us needed to be drunk or high to do so.

"I am quite possibly the happiest guy on the planet," Dorge said, encouraging students to follow their dreams.

Dorge has been giving motivational speeches to students for seven years. When he was touring with the Crash Test Dummies, he said people would always ask him what was the quickest route from taking lessons to becoming a rock star, so he stopped playing and started talking.

"I get to do my own thing with an audience that is willing to listen," he said. "Afterwards I get to hang with people and that's what I enjoy. It's not like a band; it's like a connection. If I can talk to people, hear stories, and provide some small degree of motivation in some small way, I think I'm making a difference and I'm contributing to the world."

Dorge admits his celebrity helps him get his foot in the door, "but after I've been talking for 10 minutes, they don't care."

After all, he is one generation removed from the kids he speaks to.

"They (just) know I'm a drummer from some band," Dorge said.

Dorge encouraged the students to do what they want in life, and talked about growing up playing drums every day of his life. He said that the coolest thing he ever got to do was perform on Saturday Night Live. Dorge said afterwards he went out with Adam Sandler and Chris Farley and "ripped New York City apart and got home at 6 a.m."

He visited Yellowknife with the Dummies 15 years ago, but the band just landed, played and left again. Dorge says that if a Yellowknife school asked him to come back, he would, but he would also bring his 13-year-old daughter and his 10-year-old son from Winnipeg to "see the North."