Drummer, 52, loses brave cancer fight

An avid drummer who lost a short battle with cancer has been remembered as a “very caring man who would do anything for anyone”.

Dad-of-one Daryn Garlinge, 52, died last month after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.

His wife Jacqui, 53, says her husband, who served as a business analyst at the Brakes food company in Ashford for 16 years, would “drop everything to help people”.

But in July his family received the terrible news that he had pancreatic cancer which had already spread through his body, with doctors giving him up to two years to live.

However this shocking estimate was even more hopeful than reality, as he tragically only survived another eight weeks.

Despite wanting to remain at home with Jacqui and their 13-year-old Josh, Daryn - of Singleton - had to move to the Pilgrims Hospice for his last day after deteriorating and suffering a fall.

Jacqui was thankful for being able to be with him and she has now set up a fundraiser for the hospice in Daryn’s name.

“I have been overwhelmed by all the responses and how much people felt for him,” Jacqui said.

“He really was such a family man and the life he loved most was being home with me and Josh.”

Daryn was born in Canterbury before being brought up in Frogham and attending Nonington Primary School.

He then went to the former Aylesham Secondary School.

He loved football and that passion was only surpassed when he got his first drum kit at the age of 14.

Jacqui said: “He left for London when he was 16 to get involved with all the punk bands, his poor parents must have thought ‘Oh my God!’”

Eventually he found a group of like-minded musicians in the form of Axegrinder, and the band soon found themselves recording songs under professional labels.

But the band went their separate ways and Daryn soon found himself living in Ashford and working at the United Response care home in the town, which is where he met Jacqui.

Meeting in 1993, they would eventually start going out in 1998 but only got married in 2018.

Jacqui chuckled: “So it only took us 20 years, but I’m really glad we got to do it.”

It was around this time that he reconnected with his former bandmates, and Axegrinder started gigging once more.

The group even performed as far afield as Gran Canaria and Barcelona, with the coronavirus pandemic quashing their tour of America and Canada scheduled for this year.

‘I have been overwhelmed by all the responses...’ - Jacqui Garlinge

Daryn raised more than £1,000 for the Pilgrims Hospice in 2013 by cutting his long hair, which he had spent nine years growing

Daryn Garlinge with wife Jacqui and son Josh; the pair met in 1993 and got married in 2018