Fast-Fourier Transform Data Input

I have time-dependent data that I would like to run a Faster-Fourier transform on. The data is in an ASCII text file. The first column of the data file has the time, and the other columns include the response of different instruments in my experiment. How can I get Matlab to read the file, such that I can use the fft(x) command? I'd also like to output my data into a text file, so that I can plot the results in Excel, which is how I'm plotting the rest of the output from my experiment.

Thanks, Allen