Ben,
You can create a style that would output just the last name of the first author a tab space then the year so the resulting file could be imported into Excel.
I have attached a zip with a style you can try out.
The style is setup if there is more than one author then it does author, et al.
You can adjust that setting in the style if needed.
You can use the following steps to add the style to EndNote:
Save the attachment from this post to your desktop.
Unzip the file.
Double-click on the file to open it in the EndNote software.
Click the File menu in EndNote and select Save As.
Click Save.
Close the style window.
You can now delete the other files the style has been added to EndNote.
You can then select the references you want to export in EndNote.
Go to File then Export.
Name the file.
At the bottom of the window find Select Another Style and locate the new style.
Click Save.
You should then be able to go into Excel and open the file. Excel will put the authors in a column and the years in another.
Please let me know if you have any trouble with the above steps or have a follow up question
first author last name and year only.zip (1016 Bytes)