Hi @mattholamieux,
I am also interested in that stuff (see my Live Looper for SP, which is still alpha and work in progress as I do only have limeted time ressources).
If you are interested we could exchange, what we have so far … I have also a pre-alpha sketch of a sampling application for SP, which I currently control via Beatstep.
My plans are to control these applications via a Grid. I own an Adafruit Unztrument, which I still have to learn to program; I am also planning to buy a Monome Grid (which seems to have already some support for SP); so we definitely do share some ideas and the enthusiasm for things like mlr.