Maybe there is life in Venice, CA, that doesn't involve the beach; iron pumpers and Suicidal Tendencies, since that's all you seem to hear about. Yes? Of course, there is always EXCEL! Their demos were major impression sessions and now with the release of their first album "Split Image", the direction of EXCEL is officially exposed. Combining a rabble-rousing attack of metal with deep hardcore roots, the outcome is thick and heavy with sudden excursions into the rapids. Paced by ample guitar chunka chunka's axe man Adam Siegel works the frets on compositions that are interesting yet not overly original. Dan Clements' talk-singing type of vocal projection fits well with the EXCEL approach, and comes in at the right places. EXCEL is definitely brick material, hard and sturdy. Not suffering from snare core, they advance with sonic power and creep forth with an awesome fatness. These ten tracks are butter waiting to melt in your mouth. The standout numbers are "Insecurity" and 'Split Image". Look for the wickedly insane colored sleeve in your neighborhood noise destroys shop and Excel to the register. Pushead-Thrasher magazine 2/88

Although I'm a long-established metal fan, never particularly fond of punk or hardcore in general, I keep bumping into all these hardcore bands that bowl me over with their sound, but they've still got enough of the punk attitude to keep most of the pre-metal fans happy. D.R.I. Suicidal Tendencies. Crumbsuckers. Cro-Mags. Joining that list is EXCEL, whom I was listening to before I checked out any of the aforementioned bands, and whom I like better, but who have only recently gotten their act off the ground in a vinyl sense. The album is called Split Image. Firmly rooted in territory marked by Sabbath at one end and Metallica at the other. With heavier riffs than perhaps any other hardcore band around, EXCEL's self-description as "power grinding hardcore" seems perfect. Vocalist Dan Clements: "EXCEL was formed from a band called Chaotic Noise, an L.A. punk band that was formed in 1983. It consisted of me, Adam Siegel and a former drummer. We were in our teens at the time. We had a different bassist every four months, and people just figured we were unstable. We were punk rock, but we were very much into what was starting to happen in metal. We decided to change the name and start fresh, and we showed one of our roadies, Shaun Ross, how to play bass. He's been our bassist ever since." With the addition of drummer Greg Saenz, the line-up has been stable for a couple of years. It was during this time that EXCEL recorded some demos that got their name circulating around the underground. The Sonic Decapitation demo was step in the right direction, but it was 1985's Personal Onslaught tape that garnered the band the most attention up to that point. 'We got a lot of mail from that tape, a lot of response," remembers Dan. "Following that, we were on the welcome to Venice compilation, then we did one more demo called Refuse to Quit. That one was never officially released. After that, out next big project was the Split Image album. The album was co-produced by Dan and thrash specialist Randy Burns (Megadeth, Possessed). What you hear is actually a fairly original sounding band, with the Sabbath, speed metal and punk influences equally balanced and fine-tuned. "For us, EXCEL means to move ahead and not to give up, and that's the way it's been for us," says Dan. 'we've always wanted to stay ahead of our own game and excel at what we do." Don Kaye-Kerrang! magazine 1988