You could use a regular bulb with a light dimmer, but I don't know if they make a dimmer for a lamp. Also, only some LED bulbs can be dimmed.
I think every lamp in my house is inherited, and all of the ones with switches that have a turn knob are 3-way. They must have been popular at one time. I gave up on 3-way bulbs decades ago. The double click ON/OFF is just a habit now.
After purchasing one three way light bulb for a vintage pole lamp (it's still in there) it didn't increase or decrease lighting at all. Very disappointed that I have to click through to turn it on without that happening. I guess I need a vintage three way light bulb as well
We have a 3-way light in our living room. The instructions that came with the light states, "Don't use a 3-way light. Use only a 72W Soft White" and we do. Touch the lamp 3 times to get it fully bright. Funny, that this is a 3-Way light, but can't use a typical 3-Way light bulb, but the 72W bulb works fine.
Energy saving LED lamps are great but I have experienced some pitfalls. Cheap lamps often flicker and fail regularly. Many operate at 12volts, the mains dropper unit does not rectify the output, poor lamps really flicker. You can now buy dimmable LEDs. great idea. I fitted them to a centre light fitting that had consumed 200watts halogen. The LEDs consumed 12watts. I fitted a LAP dimmer, advertised to operate at 5watts. It didn't, the best I could trim it gave just two positions, the lower one famously flickered. Since then I have read of many complaints, beware.
Early LEDs weren't nearly bright enough to be useful for anything but nightlights, but I'm pretty happy with them now. They're way better than the curly bulbs. I don't look for the cheapest ones, though.
I have finally given in to LEDs and have indeed saved on our electric bill. I'm disappointed though that the brightness is very noticeably less than before. I still have the old ones that I switched out and use them when I need them.
Trump reversed the ban on incandescent bulbs so I had assumed they were available again. Perhaps the market hasn't decided whether to retool. Yeah, the LED bulbs aren't as bright or as comfortable as the incandescent ones but the newer ones come a lot closer than the earlier ones did.
A few years ago we replaced all halogen bulbs in our RV with LEDs. It is amazing how much cooler the LEDs operate; those old halogens would get so hot I was always worried that the flimsy materials in the RV would catch fire. The LEDs work great though I'm not crazy about the light color. They certainly use a lot less power which makes a big difference when using house batteries in an RV. New RVs come with LEDs as standard equipment now.