Without Brian Epstein to manage their career, the Beatles became fearful of what lay ahead for them. Just a few months after Epstein’s death, Magical Mystery Tour was released in the UK as a soundtrack album for an upcoming Beatles’ film. An American author described the US Magical Mystery Tour this way: “The psychedelic sound is very much in the vein of Sgt. Pepper, and even spacier in parts (especially the sound collages of I Am the Walrus)” and dubbed its five songs “huge, glorious, and innovative.” The album set a record for having the highest initial sales of any Capitol LP in its first three weeks. The Magical Mystery Tour film aired on BBC1 on December 26, 1967. It focused mostly on Ringo Starr and his recently widowed Auntie Jessie. Unfortunately, the film was a flop, with the Beatles and the others who worked on the film blaming it on the fact that the film, though shot in color, was broadcast in black and white.
