[1][2] The song, named after the American singer and actress Barbra Streisand, relies almost entirely on a sample replay of German disco group Boney M.'s 1979 international hit single "Gotta Go Home",[3] which in turn borrows content from the 1973 German song "Hallo Bimmelbahn" by the band Nighttrain (the brothers Heinz and Jürgen Huth and Michael Holm; the hookline was written only by Heinz Huth).

The music video is set in New York City (where Barbra Streisand was born) and it features many prominent and affiliated artists making cameo appearances, such as Kanye West, Pharrell Williams, André 3000, Ryan Leslie, Buckshot, Cocoa Brovaz, DJ Premier, Todd Terry, Chromeo, DJ Mehdi, So Me (who also directed the video),[5] Diplo, Ezra Koenig, Santigold, Yelawolf, Questlove and Fafi and The Fat Jew of Team Facelift.

[7] Nick Levine of Digital Spy gave the song five out of five stars, stating, "... 'Barbra Streisand' actually kinda suits the track, a sassy, no-messin' disco-house dazzler which tips its trilby in the direction of Studio 54 circa 1979 – happily enough, just when Babs was enjoying her own dancefloor dalliance with 'The Main Event' / 'Fight' and 'No More Tears'.

"[8] Jason Lipshutz from Billboard gave the song a positive review, describing it as "one of the weirdest, most intoxicating dance anthems in recent memory," and wrote: "The most surprising thing about this collaboration ... is its richness in sound in between the beat-stopping utterances of Streisand's name.

The busy instrumentation is brilliantly paired with overly simple vocals: An upbeat chorus of 'oohs' instantly lodges inside the listener's brain, and 'Barbra Streisand' morphs into an inexplicable command to start dancing.